The TOP Swiss Fintech Startups 2021

Switzerland’s fintech sector continues to grow: The country provides a welcoming environment for innovative solutions that boost decentralization and disruption. Get to know the eight fintech startups that impressed the expert jury and the public the most this year: Discover how the companies make banking services, investment management, and cryptocurrencies more accessible, efficient, and affordable.

The TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award showcases the most promising Swiss startups. The annual ranking has become a benchmark in Switzerland’s startup ecosystem—and beyond. Every year, a panel of 100 leading investors and startup experts chooses the 100 most innovative and promising Swiss startups. Each jury member nominates 10 Swiss startups that are less than five years old and show the greatest commercial potential. The first-placed company gets 10 points, the second nine points, and so on. The individual rankings are compiled to generate the final TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award ranking. In parallel, the TOP 100 Public Voting allows everyone with a LinkedIn account can cast one vote and choose the most promising startup per vertical.
 
The TOP 100 Jury and the public selected eight fintech startups to be among the TOP 100 Swiss Startups 2021: 



20. Yokoy 
Yokoy automates expense management based on artificial intelligence. Simply take a photo of the receipt, and the expenses are checked and processed automatically in the customer’s financial system. More than 300 data points are recorded when reading out a single receipt; the finance department’s fraud control can record over 5,000 data points. The system has been working for supplier invoices since June, and the aim is to cover expenses management entirely.

23. neon Switzerland 
neon offers inexpensive, app-based banking. And it is on an expansion course—customer growth last year was about 3,000 per month. The offer is particularly popular with the younger generation: A study on brand preferences 2021 by Havas Switzerland showed that neon had achieved the highest rise in popularity among under 26-year-olds, with an increase of 70%.

25. Inyova (formerly Yova) 
Inyova (formerly Yova) operates a digital platform for environmentally conscious investors. According to the personal preferences of the investors, investment proposals are selected from a pool of about 400 companies that have a positive impact on the environment or society. In spring, the Zurich startup closed a financing round of CHF 11 million.

27. Sygnum Bank 
Sygnum is the world’s first bank to offer its customers a portfolio of traditional banking services for digital assets. In addition to the B2C business, the startup gives traditional financial institutions the opportunity to offer their customers services related to crypto assets. In February, Sygnum announced it had received an eight-digit USD investment.

48. Taurus Group 
Bitcoins, or ether, must be stored in a theft-proof way, and the Taurus Group acts as a service provider for the financial industry in the administration and storage of cryptocurrencies and digital securities. Since April 2021, the Geneva-based company has also operated a regulated marketplace for crypto assets under the name TDX Digital eXchange.

97. IMburse
IMburse, founded in 2018 with headquarters in Zurich’s financial district and a branch in London, operates a cloud-based Payments-as-a-Service platform. It enables companies to integrate different payment technologies into their IT systems via a single connection. In June this year, IMburse closed a Series A financing round of USD 12 million.

100. Sonect 
The Sonect app can be used to withdraw cash in kiosks, shops, and restaurants. The network currently has about 2,300 points of sale. In May, the Zurich startup entered into a sales partnership with the payment app Twint, which has brought more than 70,000 new users to the platform. International business is expanding in parallel to domestic expansion, with about 100 points of sale integrated in Germany and pilot projects running in the UK.

Public Voting: SwissBorg
SwissBorg accelerates the world’s transition to decentralized nations. The Lausanne-based startup aims to democratize wealth management by making it fun, fair, and community-centric. SwissBorg’s transparent strategy combines technology and decentralization into a holistic approach to create a technology-driven digital-asset ecosystem based on three pillars: information, entertainment, and investment.