Media release – Lausanne, January 25, 2021

2.1 billion for Swiss startups
Investment in Vaud based startups reach CHF 409.1 million; record number of financing rounds in our canton since 2012.
The Coronavirus epidemic since March 2020 has had an impact on fundraising in Switzerland. Nevertheless, investors have financed Swiss startups in a stable manner: 2.1 billion francs in 2020, versus 2.2 billion francs in 2019. In the canton of Vaud, the year 2020 recorded a very slight decrease of investments, linked to the lockdown in March and the fact that many investors pressed on the brakes until the second half of 2020. Vaud investments nonetheless reached CHF 409.1 million in 2020, against CHF 455.7 million in 2019. The number of financing rounds in our canton has significantly increased, from 48 in 2019 to 55 in 2020, a record figure since the first systematic survey carried out in 2012. The trend is the same throughout Switzerland: While the cumulative volume of venture capital investments has decreased, the number of funding cycles has increased by 16% compared to 2019, reaching 304. This is indicated by the latest Swiss Venture Capital Report, produced by Startupticker.ch online information portal in collaboration with SECA (the Swiss Private Equity & Corporate Finance Association).

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