The Venture Codex

Participated · Equity · Jul 2023

Nezasa provides a SaaS platform to enable the connected trip, automating the planning, booking and management of multi-stage tour itineraries. Its platform allows travel brands to sell itineraries faster, more efficiently and with greater flexibility than manual processes. Led by founder and CEO Manuel Hilty, Nezasa intends to stimulate innovations in its product offerings. The company plans to use the new funding for international expansion and to accelerate the path to profitability. Nezasa closed a $4.7M funding round and will direct proceeds toward growth and product development. Nezasa provides a Software-as-a-Service booking platform that enables fully automated, seamless planning and booking of personalized travel. The platform is used by about 12,000 travel agencies and tour operators, including major customers such as FTI and DER Touristik. Its automation reduces costs for travel sellers while increasing revenues through higher-value baskets. The company raised additional growth capital to scale operations and handle a high volume of incoming requests. Management says the funding will also let Nezasa pursue new business opportunities as the travel market recovers after COVID. Manuel Hilty, co-founder and CEO, commented that the company is now well positioned to capture additional market share and advance digitalization and personalization for travel providers. Nezasa offers a booking platform that enables tour operators and travel retailers to automate the offering, customization and booking of trips. The platform allows consumers and travel agents to plan, personalize and book trips within minutes while showing how changes affect the entire travel plan. Using Nezasa, tour operators can attract more clients and reduce their cost to serve. Today more than 12,000 travel agents have access to the Nezasa platform; clients include FTI Touristik, Viamonda, Fineway, Berge & Meer, vtours and Swiss Travel Centre. The company will use the CHF 2.5 million Series A to accelerate sales and marketing and to execute its product roadmap. Management also plans to expand marketing and sales capabilities to tap into international markets. Nezasa offers a one-stop platform to design and book personalised travel itineraries, combining the service of an offline travel agency with the immediacy and transparent pricing of an online site. Travellers tell Nezasa where they want to go and receive suggested routes from destination experts, then fine-tune duration, stops and activities. The platform consolidates bookings for hotels, transfers and activities, and customers are supported by a local tour operator upon arrival. Nezasa is currently targeting travellers from English-speaking countries but plans to roll out globally. Its offered destinations span seven Asian countries, with plans to expand to more of Asia, then Africa, and finally Latin America. The company has pursued airline partnerships (it recently joined forces with Austrian Airlines) to accelerate growth and has raised just over $1.1 million to date.

Led · Series A · Jun 2023

Tinamu Labs is an ETH spin-off that provides indoor drone monitoring systems and automated inventory monitoring for bulk cargo using patented technology, indoor flight know-how, and workflow automation. Its core offering is a flexible turnkey solution combining hardware and software to automate periodic stockpile volume measurements without piloting skills or GPS. The service is used by customers in mining, commodity trading, construction and logistics, including Kibag, and the company plans installations at multiple Trafigura locations. Launched in 2022 and based in Zurich, Tinamu has exported its solution to Belgium and France and is expanding to additional client locations in Europe. A technology partnership with Parrot will allow Tinamu to progressively upgrade clients to the ANAFI Ai drone to deliver a full turnkey package. The company recently raised CHF 1 million in a pre-Series A financing led by Alpana Ventures and DAA Capital Partners to accelerate growth. Proceeds will fund onboarding of upcoming installations, sales activities and planned hiring, and Tinamu is preparing for a Series A to support global expansion. Tinamu Labs, founded in 2018 as an ETH Zurich spin-off, provides a fully automated drone system that captures and analyses inspection data and shares insights in real time. Its patented, GPS-independent solution is designed for challenging indoor and outdoor industrial environments and requires no drone pilot. After deploying functional prototypes in June 2021, the company has closed annually recurring contracts in the six‑digit range and has deployed two systems nationally and one internationally. The startup is accelerating product development to move the early product to a scalable version and is hiring additional talent to support its go-to-market journey. To support commercialization, Tinamu has concluded a seed financing round extension and will use the funds to speed up time to market. The company’s early deployments and recurring revenues validate its business model while it prepares for broader global rollout. Tinamu Labs, founded in 2018 as an ETH Zurich spin-off, develops an automated end-to-end drone inspection system based on patented GPS-independent technology. The system autonomously collects data, performs cloud-based analysis, and delivers relevant information to customers without requiring a drone pilot thanks to remote access control. Its solution is aimed at indoor and challenging environments and is being evaluated by companies in the energy, mining, and commodity trading sectors, with Axpo as its first industry partner. The startup plans to use the new capital to expand its team and accelerate internal and international growth, with particular interest in entering the US market. Financially, Tinamu secured CHF 1.1 million in a seed round led by Alpana Ventures. As part of the round, Silicon Valley entrepreneur Alex Fries joined the board to support US expansion.

Participated · Series C · Nov 2022

Beekeeper provides a suite of tools to engage the deskless frontline workforce across hospitality, retail, manufacturing, logistics and healthcare. Its platform includes messaging, surveys, video and voice chats, FAQ chatbots, workflow automation (for onboarding), shift scheduling, documents, forms and analytics for managers. Founded out of Switzerland in 2011 and based in Zurich, Beekeeper has enterprise customers including Hilton and Cargill. The company says revenue has risen 100% since the start of the pandemic. Beekeeper competes with the likes of Connecteam, WorkStep, WorkJam and Skedulo. It plans to double down on product development and build on recent growth with the new funding. Beekeeper is a mobile communication and operations platform designed specifically for frontline workers and is led by CEO Cristian Grossmann. The platform connects millions of global users across customers such as Panera Bread and Mandarin Oriental to improve productivity, agility, and safety. Beekeeper provides mobile-first features including chat, surveys, digital forms, workflows, and integrations to surface relevant information and processes for every frontline worker. The company announced Beekeeper 2.0, which adds a new app entry point, automated translations into 100+ languages, custom FAQ chatbots, digital forms and workflows, and out-of-the-box integrations with SharePoint and popular shift scheduling software. Beekeeper intends to use the funds to expand its cloud marketplace for apps, solutions, and integrations. Financially, Beekeeper completed a $10M Series B extension that brought the round’s total to $60M. Beekeeper offers a mobile-first communications platform designed to connect non-desk and service-oriented workers in industries such as hospitality, manufacturing and retail. The product is pitched as a “Slack for non-desk employees” and aims to replace pen-and-paper workflows and consumer messaging apps like WhatsApp. The company targets a large addressable market — it cites that more than 80% of the world’s workers are non-desk and estimates 1.7 billion are unconnected or poorly connected. Beekeeper counts customers including Hyatt Hotels, Dollar General, Domino’s Pizza, Heathrow Airport and SeaBoard Foods. Financially, the company has just completed a $45M Series B. On the product roadmap Beekeeper plans new features and integrations, including a marketplace for custom apps and integrations with systems such as Workday to bridge gaps between knowledge workers and non-desk staff. Beekeeper offers a secure communication and operations platform designed for non-desk and on-demand workers, enabling companies to track messages and replace email with secure messaging. The app includes machine translation to enable cross-language and cross-geography communication and emphasizes security, compliance, and integrations. Customers span hospitality, manufacturing, retail, construction, transport and logistics, food production, NGOs and healthcare, and the product is used by organizations such as Heathrow Airport and Marriott Hotels. Beekeeper is available in 130 countries and is described in the article as a global market leader serving a large addressable market of roughly 2 billion non-desk workers. Financially, the company has raised roughly $26m to date following the latest $13m round. Management has stated a long-term ambition of pursuing a public listing as an exit option. Beekeeper is a mobile-first communications platform that connects companies with non-desk, hourly and service-oriented employees. The platform is designed to replace pen-and-paper and consumer messaging apps and offers password-less onboarding via QR codes so workers without corporate email can join. Beekeeper has found a market in retail, hospitality, manufacturing and transportation and says a number of Fortune 500 companies have adopted the service. Recent customer wins include Mandarin Oriental, Dollar General, Seaboard Foods, Heathrow Airport, Gate Group and Dnata. The company is Switzerland- and U.S.-based and plans to use new funding to fund aggressive U.S. and EMEA market expansion and to expand into new industries. CEO Cristian Grossmann said Beekeeper saw significant momentum in 2016 after investments in customer success and new features, and the product intentionally targets shift-based hourly workers rather than office-based productivity tools.

Participated · Series A · Jun 2022

Mila provides on-demand, vetted, crowdsourced technical support and installation services through a network of trained technicians and its Mila Academy. Since 2016 it has expanded from Switzerland into Germany, Austria, France, and the UK, and maintains offices in Berlin and Zürich with a new London location. The company reports over 11,000 trained technicians and more than 40 enterprise/brand partners, and says it experienced over 300% growth in Germany in 2021. Mila continues to serve Swisscom and enterprise customers including Amazon, Otto, BOSCH, and Google. The company offers installation, configuration, and integration services and plans to introduce EV charging station installations in Germany and the UK in Q2. With the MATTER IoT standard release targeted for fall 2022, Mila positions itself to address connected-device interoperability challenges for global brands. Mila is a location-based mobile marketplace for tasks and products that lets people find, discover and buy services from people in their neighbourhood or earn extra cash by offering their own services. It operates on mobile web and web and is currently revamping its iOS and Android apps. Mila is a spin-off from CoreSystems, a Swiss mobile enterprise platform provider backed by SAP, and also has operations in Zurich and Berlin. The company has a global footprint and is concentrating on emerging markets, targeting cities such as Shanghai and Jakarta. Mila raised $3.22 million (€2.46 million) from private Swiss and German technology investors and will use the funding to expand in Indonesia and China. Named investors include Peter Zencke and Adrian Bult.

Participated · Series A · Mar 2022

Altoida’s core product is a precision neurology platform that uses AI to analyze a proprietary 10-minute set of digital test activities delivered via augmented reality on a smartphone or tablet to capture cognitive and functional changes. The AR-based tests simulate activities of daily living to detect Mild Cognitive Impairment and Alzheimer’s earlier and more accurately than existing methods; the platform has received FDA Breakthrough Device Designation. The company says its technology is intended to accelerate and improve drug development, research, and clinical care for neurological diseases and to validate applications across Parkinson’s and schizophrenia. Altoida plans to invest in medical, scientific, engineering, and commercial teams, and to expand its US and global intellectual property and regulatory portfolios. The platform is supported by more than 20 years of scientific research and aims to address the large and growing global burden of Alzheimer’s and related dementias. Altoida is based in Washington, D.C. Altoida develops an FDA-cleared and CE Mark–approved medical device and brain health data platform that uses AI, ML and AR to collect functional and cognitive digital biomarkers. The company leverages smart device sensors and interactive tasks (asking patients to hide and seek virtual objects) to analyze visuospatial and executive function and detect ‘‘micro-errors’’ as prognostic and diagnostic biomarkers. Altoida’s technology is used by researchers, patients and physicians to detect Mild Cognitive Impairment due to Alzheimer’s disease in patients 62+ years old between six and ten years prior to symptom onset. The platform and methodology have been validated in more than 12 peer-reviewed publications and over 200 independent studies. Altoida says the new financing will support expansion in the US, Japan, Europe and Brazil. The company is led by Dr. Richard Fischer and has offices in Houston, San Diego and Lucerne, Switzerland. Altoida develops an FDA-cleared and CE Mark-approved medical device and brain-health data platform that objectively assesses cognitive and everyday functions prior to symptom onset. Its product leverages artificial intelligence, machine learning and augmented reality to collect functional and cognitive biomarkers. The platform analyzes visuospatial and executive function through a battery of three tests that ask patients to hide and seek virtual objects in physical space. Altoida has been validated in more than 12 peer-reviewed publications and over 200 independent studies and is used in clinics across the US, Europe and Brazil. The company raised $6.3M in a Series A and intends to use the capital to expand its global presence with an immediate focus on commercialization in the US and EU markets. Altoida maintains offices in Houston, San Diego and Lucerne, Switzerland.