Flybotix Raises CHF 1.5 Million to Bring its Inspection Drones to Market

Dr. Samir Bouabdallah, Flybotix CEO, and Alexandre Cherpillod, Co-founder and project and product development manager (Photo by François Wavre ¦ Lundi 13)

Dr. Bouabdallah, what are Flybotix’s mission and core innovation?
At Flybotix, we develop professional inspection drones that save the energy industry money and time while reducing risks for humans. Our core innovation combines the flight time of conventional helicopters with the simplicity of drones into a unique technology that uses only two rotors, compared to the four rotors that traditional drones use. This way, we can double the flight time, which results in shorter inspection durations and shorter shut-down times of the production plants. Indoor inspection drones also reduce the exposure of human inspectors to risks, especially in dangerous and difficult-to-reach spaces.

How will the CHF 1.5 million investment help you achieve this mission?
With the seed round we just closed, we aim to continue the development of the technology, industrialize the product, and bring it to market as planned.

You won Venture Kick in 2019, and in the same year, you also traveled to China for the Venture Leaders China roadshow. How did these two programs help you lay the foundation for Flybotix’s growth and this investment?
The Venture Kick competition was instrumental in supporting us financially and in providing us with feedback and advice to enhance our business idea and later our business case. We were thrilled to participate in the Venture Leaders roadshow in China last summer. It was very useful in helping us refine our business strategy and in better understanding the Chinese market reality, the Chinese way of working, and the risks versus the benefits for a startup that wants to start out in China. This is valuable knowledge that would have taken us much more time and energy to figure out if we had not been able to participate in such a condensed roadshow experience. At this point, I would like to thank the entire team at Venturelab and Venture Kick for their extraordinary support. We had an awesome time in China, and we are still in touch with the participants of the Swiss National Startup Team 2019. I recommend the program to any startup that considers China as its potential future market.

Considering the current circumstances: How does COVID-19 affect your business?
We are following the situation closely, with the help of Venturelab and the cantonal economic development office. We took some cash-saving measures to extend our runway, and we also tried to establish scenarios to help analyze the possible impacts on our company. So, we decided to proceed but keep the burn rate under control as much as possible. We probably have been very lucky by being able to close the financing round at the beginning of March, but if the crisis lasts too long, we will have very difficult times— like many other startups.


In 2019, Flybotix won CHF 40,000 through the Venture Kick program and was a Venture Leader China before participating in ESA BIC Switzerland in 2020.