Building World Class Startups at VentureLab | Raffael Kellner
Raffael Kellner of VentureLab on how Swiss startup support programmes, Swiss venture capital and international go-to-market coaching turn research teams into investable companies.
Key insights: executive summary
- Switzerland's startup support stack is unusually structured: staged programmes take teams from idea to internationally investable in a defined sequence.
- The most common gap in Swiss deep tech is commercial storytelling, not technical quality.
- Founders who go to market internationally from day one raise better rounds than those who validate only in Switzerland.
- Swiss venture capital rewards evidence of customer pull, which programme coaching is designed to force early.
- ETH Zurich spinoffs benefit most when scientific founders pair with a commercial co-founder early.
“Swiss technical quality is rarely the problem. Explaining why anyone should buy it this year usually is.”
“Programmes do not create founders. They compress the time it takes founders to find out whether they have a company.”
How does Switzerland turn research into fundable startups?
The Swiss model layers federal innovation funding, university spinoff support and structured coaching programmes such as VentureLab. Each stage forces a harder commercial question, which filters projects before venture capital is involved.
What do investors look for in Zurich deep tech startups?
Evidence that a specific customer has a budget line for the problem, a defensible technical edge that survives due diligence, and a team that can hire internationally out of Zurich.
Who is Raffael Kellner?
Raffael Kellner is a Startup programme lead at VentureLab, part of the Zurich deep tech ecosystem this series documents. Topics covered in this episode: Swiss venture capital, Tech entrepreneurship, ETH Zurich spinoffs, Startup programmes.
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