Startups developing a device for sport performance tracking, the next-gen lights, tools for sustainable densification, nanotechnology for solar energy conversion, and a platform for alternative investments each win CHF 10,000
19.01.2022
Aiving, Aurora, RAUMPIONIERE, Solaxer, and Splint Invest win Venture Kick's first stage of financial and entrepreneurial support. Their projects offer an easy-to-use wearable device coupled with algorithms that compute key figure skating performance indicators, enable a highly efficient cultivation lamp to bring Switzerland a big step forward in agricultural technology, can localize and analyze the densification potential of any property at the push of a button, aims to help industries cut reliance on fossil fuels by delivering new generation receivers for efficient solar heat harvesting, and offer access to many unserved retail customers when it comes to portfolio diversification and alternative investments.
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 Aiving: (from left to right)
Juan Lahera - Firmware support - Senior Firmware Engineer at CSEM
Dr. Ricard Delgado - Project management support - Head of Embedded Software Group at CSEM
Halla Sigurthorsdottir - Founder
Valerie Springmann - Co-founder
Virginien Schaffter - Electronics support - Senior Electrical Engineer at CSEM
Missing are:
Mathilde Crettaz - Mechanical support - Senior Mechanical Engineer at CSEM
Anaelle Manon - Mechanical engineering intern
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 Aurora's Team: From left to right: Remo Oberholzer, CEO – Michael Blickenstorfer, CIO – Samuel Beer, CFO
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 RAUMPIONIERE: (from left to right)
- Andreas Trunz (CGO)
- Barnabás Tóth (Senior Software Engineer)
- Atilla Färber (CEO)
- Bartlomiej (aka Bartek) Domek (CTO)
- Tamás Attila Kiss (CMO)
- Christoph Maria Giger (CPO)
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 Solaxer co-founders Anna Krammer and Maxime Lagier, and advisors Andreas Schueler and Jean-Christophe Hadorn
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 Splint Invest: CEO Aurelio Perucca, Product Owner Robin Muster, Investment Analyst Kris Konieczka, Head of Compliance Alex Hofmann, Head of investments Mario von Bergen, and CTO Alexander
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Aiving: A wearable device for figure skating performance tracking
Figure skating is a very technical sport where accurate information is key. Today, athletes and coaches are training less efficiently than they could be, which leads to preventable injuries and loss of motivation of the athletes. Moreover, judging in this sport is subjective, which leads to disagreements. Top-level athletes and judges all the way to hobby-level athletes would welcome specialized activity monitoring that leads to a richer flow of information in the sport.
Aiving, developed by Founder Halla Sigurthorsdottir, data scientist at CSEM, offers an easy-to-use wearable device coupled with algorithms that compute key figure skating performance indicators. Athletes and coaches would buy the wearable device coupled with a mobile application where they will be able to get instant results, keep track of their progress, and get personalized recommendations. Competition organizers will also be able to buy the wearable device coupled with a computer application that provides accurate results during competition and integrates them with existing technologies.
The Aiving team plans to use the Venture Kick funds for the next big milestone: to develop the company and implement the solution to be used by the International Skating Union at figure skating competitions. This will in turn give Aiving credibility with clubs, coaches, and ultimately with individual skaters.
Aurora: The next generation of light
The plant cultivation lamps used in today's industry are mostly energy inefficient and, depending on the type, usually have a fixed light spectrum, which means they can only respond to the individual needs of the plants to a limited extent.
Aurora is the current project name for an intelligent lamp system for plant cultivation, developed by ZHAW affiliated Michael - Blickenstorfer Lead Microcontroller & Broker Developer, Samuel Beer - Microcontroller & Broker Developer, Philipp Osterwalder - CMO & Sales, and Carla Biasotto - Product Designer. Self-developed electronics and state-of-the-art software enable a highly efficient cultivation lamp with a fully adaptive and reproducible light spectrum ranging from deep UVC to far-infrared. It was built for research purposes to bring Switzerland a big step forward in agricultural technology. With an individually configurable app, it is possible for the customer to adjust the light spectrum over a daily cycle or to simulate different climates and vegetation zones as required. With its smart software and sensors, the Lamp itself can not only react to its changing environment but becomes also intelligent to support users in crop production. A smart gardener -at the touch of a button. The demand for economic and ecological lighting will increase steadily in the future, as not only horticultural crops but also vertical farms experience an enormous hype. Besides this, there is a need for networkability and complete integration into existing systems, which is being driven by IoT (Internet of Things) and Industry 4.0 and is already integrated as state-of-the-art in Aurora's lamp system.
The Venture Kick funds will be used to reach development status prototype 1.0 by the end of 2020 with a scalable product, and market readiness until end-2021. project-aurora.ch
Solaxer: Nanotechnology for Solar Energy Conversion
3/4 of the energy consumed in the industry is used for heat generation, 90% of which is coming from fossil fuels. Industrial heat generation is responsible for 20% of the global carbon emissions accounting for 6.6 Gts of CO2 yearly.
SOLAXER aims to help industries cut reliance on fossil fuels by delivering new generation receivers for efficient solar heat harvesting. The project is developed by co-founders Anna Krammer - EPFL Postdoctoral Researcher with a Ph.D. in the domain of solar selective coatings, and Maxime Lagier - EPFL R&D Project Engineer with an MSc in Materials Science. Their receivers are coated with an innovative selective absorber coating with superior durability and optical performance, through a patented, cost- and energy-efficient manufacturing process. Their target is to become the first-choice supplier of solar receivers for concentrated solar collector manufacturers. The market for solar heating for industrial processes up to 200°C has a huge potential with up to annual growth rates of 72% until 2030.
The Venture Kick stage 1 financing would be used for adjusting the existing prototype coater to industrial tube dimensions and creating a visual identity for Solaxer.
Splint Invest: a platform for alternatives investments
Retail investors cannot diversify their portfolios as HNWI & UHNWI. This creates inequality and puts retail investors in a situation where they face higher risks when it comes to retirement planning and financial security.
Splint Invest is a B2B2C platform, where customers can buy tokens of alternative investments. Combining smart contracts, DLT and AI, it tokenizes real-world assets effortless and fully automated. This allows Splint Invest to offer access to many unserved retail investors when it comes to portfolio diversification and alternative investments. The team is composed of CEO Aurelio Perucca; Ph.D. in Economics of the University of Basel; Head of Compliance Alex Hofmann; CTO Alexander; Ph.D. in Software Engineering at ETH Zürich; and Head of Investment Mario von Bergen. With the Splint Invest app, they offer retail investors the possibility of retail investors to buy digital fractions (Splints) of alternative investments. On their secondary market, retail investors can also trade the Splints. This solves the problem of illiquidity. The app is a platform. Institutional experts can be onboarded and sell their assets directly to retail investors. Splint Invest is offering the service of tokenization and performs the due diligence for each expert and asset. The team sees a potential total addressable market of 300 million users.
They will use the Venture Kick funds to finance the research activities for the pricing of illiquid assets and continue the research and testing for developing activities of their marketplace. splintinvest.com
Figure skating is a very technical sport where accurate information is key. Today, athletes and coaches are training less efficiently than they could be, which leads to preventable injuries and loss of motivation of the athletes. Moreover, judging in this sport is subjective, which leads to disagreements. Top-level athletes and judges all the way to hobby-level athletes would welcome specialized activity monitoring that leads to a richer flow of information in the sport.
Aiving, developed by Founder Halla Sigurthorsdottir, data scientist at CSEM, offers an easy-to-use wearable device coupled with algorithms that compute key figure skating performance indicators. Athletes and coaches would buy the wearable device coupled with a mobile application where they will be able to get instant results, keep track of their progress, and get personalized recommendations. Competition organizers will also be able to buy the wearable device coupled with a computer application that provides accurate results during competition and integrates them with existing technologies.
The Aiving team plans to use the Venture Kick funds for the next big milestone: to develop the company and implement the solution to be used by the International Skating Union at figure skating competitions. This will in turn give Aiving credibility with clubs, coaches, and ultimately with individual skaters.
Aurora: The next generation of light
The plant cultivation lamps used in today's industry are mostly energy inefficient and, depending on the type, usually have a fixed light spectrum, which means they can only respond to the individual needs of the plants to a limited extent.
Aurora is the current project name for an intelligent lamp system for plant cultivation, developed by ZHAW affiliated Michael - Blickenstorfer Lead Microcontroller & Broker Developer, Samuel Beer - Microcontroller & Broker Developer, Philipp Osterwalder - CMO & Sales, and Carla Biasotto - Product Designer. Self-developed electronics and state-of-the-art software enable a highly efficient cultivation lamp with a fully adaptive and reproducible light spectrum ranging from deep UVC to far-infrared. It was built for research purposes to bring Switzerland a big step forward in agricultural technology. With an individually configurable app, it is possible for the customer to adjust the light spectrum over a daily cycle or to simulate different climates and vegetation zones as required. With its smart software and sensors, the Lamp itself can not only react to its changing environment but becomes also intelligent to support users in crop production. A smart gardener -at the touch of a button. The demand for economic and ecological lighting will increase steadily in the future, as not only horticultural crops but also vertical farms experience an enormous hype. Besides this, there is a need for networkability and complete integration into existing systems, which is being driven by IoT (Internet of Things) and Industry 4.0 and is already integrated as state-of-the-art in Aurora's lamp system.
The Venture Kick funds will be used to reach development status prototype 1.0 by the end of 2020 with a scalable product, and market readiness until end-2021. project-aurora.ch
RAUMPIONIERE: Building without land
There is no question that the pressure on our living space will increase strongly in the coming decades. Accordingly, densification in inner cities - to protect the remaining natural spaces - and optimization of the existing building stock will be big issues for the real estate industry. The central questions are: Where are the undervalued properties and how big is their optimization potential? This is where RAUMPIONIERE comes in: The team around CGO Atilla Färber, CPO Christoph Giger, CTO Bartlomiej Domek, and CMO Tamás Kiss is fully committed to the topic of building without soil. So they have developed a suite of tools that can be used to analyze each property in terms of its potential for densification – quick, accurate, and at the push of a button. However, RAUMPIONIERE does not define itself by technology alone but takes a broader approach to the large and promising topic of sustainable densification. They are convinced that they can successfully participate in the CHF 840 million to 1.9 billion DACH market for "early-stage studies". RAUMPIONIERE will use the funds from Venture Kick to build and expand their team and further develop their tools. raumpioniereai.com
Solaxer: Nanotechnology for Solar Energy Conversion
3/4 of the energy consumed in the industry is used for heat generation, 90% of which is coming from fossil fuels. Industrial heat generation is responsible for 20% of the global carbon emissions accounting for 6.6 Gts of CO2 yearly.
SOLAXER aims to help industries cut reliance on fossil fuels by delivering new generation receivers for efficient solar heat harvesting. The project is developed by co-founders Anna Krammer - EPFL Postdoctoral Researcher with a Ph.D. in the domain of solar selective coatings, and Maxime Lagier - EPFL R&D Project Engineer with an MSc in Materials Science. Their receivers are coated with an innovative selective absorber coating with superior durability and optical performance, through a patented, cost- and energy-efficient manufacturing process. Their target is to become the first-choice supplier of solar receivers for concentrated solar collector manufacturers. The market for solar heating for industrial processes up to 200°C has a huge potential with up to annual growth rates of 72% until 2030.
The Venture Kick stage 1 financing would be used for adjusting the existing prototype coater to industrial tube dimensions and creating a visual identity for Solaxer.
Splint Invest: a platform for alternatives investments
Retail investors cannot diversify their portfolios as HNWI & UHNWI. This creates inequality and puts retail investors in a situation where they face higher risks when it comes to retirement planning and financial security.
Splint Invest is a B2B2C platform, where customers can buy tokens of alternative investments. Combining smart contracts, DLT and AI, it tokenizes real-world assets effortless and fully automated. This allows Splint Invest to offer access to many unserved retail investors when it comes to portfolio diversification and alternative investments. The team is composed of CEO Aurelio Perucca; Ph.D. in Economics of the University of Basel; Head of Compliance Alex Hofmann; CTO Alexander; Ph.D. in Software Engineering at ETH Zürich; and Head of Investment Mario von Bergen. With the Splint Invest app, they offer retail investors the possibility of retail investors to buy digital fractions (Splints) of alternative investments. On their secondary market, retail investors can also trade the Splints. This solves the problem of illiquidity. The app is a platform. Institutional experts can be onboarded and sell their assets directly to retail investors. Splint Invest is offering the service of tokenization and performs the due diligence for each expert and asset. The team sees a potential total addressable market of 300 million users.
They will use the Venture Kick funds to finance the research activities for the pricing of illiquid assets and continue the research and testing for developing activities of their marketplace. splintinvest.com