26 Jan 2021
The corona pandemic has affected risk capital events in Switzerland. Investment in 2020 in technology-driven young companies fell by 7.4% to about CHF 2.1 billion, as shown in the current Swiss Venture Capital Report from the online news portal startupticker.ch and the investor association SECA.
Since the first systematic survey in 2012, venture capital investment in Swiss start-ups has risen from about CHF 300 million to more than CHF 2 billion. Last year brought a slight decrease, with donors putting the brakes on, particularly during the first lockdown. From the summer, the number of engagements increased again and also in volume. In the second half of 2020, even more, was invested than in the same period of 2019, which was a record year, and thus there was only a comparatively moderate annual decline of about 7%.
The year with no mega-deals
Although the cumulative volume of venture capital investment decreased, the number of financing rounds rose by 14% to 304. The pandemic meant that donors were concerned primarily with making companies crisis-proof beyond the start-up phase. Less money flowed into completely new projects, but there was significantly more investment in the range of CHF 10 million to CHF 100 million. However, expansion financing of more than CHF 200 million did not take place at all.