On Thursday 13th, I attended at the SSBICom (Sino-Swiss Business Incubation Competition) in Chongqing. Chongqing is famous for its Three Gorges dam, spicy hot pot, and for being the City of Fog. Maybe soon, it will be well-known for its Swiss companies.
The SSBIcom gathered startups from the Zurich Area and gave the opportunity to the startups to present their company in 15 minutes, followed by 10 minutes Q&A. vispectiv AG won the first prize. The business target is focused on long Range Sensor Systems to survey and detect different kinds of environmental hazards. The major commercial product is based on the optical automated smoke detection system „Forest Ranger” which can be implemented into sophisticated computerized fire management systems and procedures.
The second prizes have been attributed to eBlock an Australian startup that produces prefabricated concrete panels, and holo|one. Holo-one is a Swiss IT start-up and developer of the 'sphere', an augmented reality platform for companies. Their goal is to revolutionize industries and redefine workflows. This platform brings company data and expert knowledge into Augmented Reality.
The other startups won the third prizes. Clipthis provides a simple augmented reality solution that allows you to view movie clips and animations with AR. The clips are linked to ClipThis objects, such as business cards, flyers, brochures, wallpapers etc. Through the application, users can discover interesting, fun and educational digital content while holding the video in their hands. IoTech.swiss is developing embedded AI and IoT products and solutions for the aviation/drone industry, such as Colibri, a plug and play device that aims at reducing light aircraft accidents. Kyon biotech develops a treatment for arginine-dependent cancers by systemic, deep, sustained and acute arginine depletion. Papafut offers quantum programming courses tailor-made for IT professionals.
On Friday 14th happened the Opening Ceremony of SinoSwiss Technopark. It started with an introduction speech by Mr. Liu Qi, CEO of SinoSwiss Technopark and has been followed by the award ceremony of 2018 SSBICom hosted by Markus Assfalg, Director, Office for Economy and labour, Canton Zurich; Felix Sutter, Chairman, Swiss-Chinese Chamber of Commerce; Rene Forster, Chairman, Swiss Chamber of Commerce China. It was quickly followed by speeches delivered by Mr. Paul Sives, President of EUCCC Southwest Chapter; Frank Eggmann, Consul-General of Swiss Consulate in Chengdu; Thomas Wagner, Honorary President of the Swiss-China Association and former mayor of Zurich. After the projects signing ceremony, I had the opportunity to present the activities of swissnex China in a keynote speech. Then, a tour of SinoSwiss Technopark was organized.
This Technopark is to attract Swiss SMEs from a variety of industry sectors which, with the help of a Chinese partner, would like to find their way to the Southwest of China. The park offers a total of 480’000 square meters of usable space. Besides Office, Trade, R&D and Manufacturing facilities, the park will also consist of a hotel and a great variety of restaurants, coffee shops, and bars. It is located in the New North Zone of Chongqing, which is known as the core area of economic growth and the best area to live and work in Chongqing.
I would like to thank Dominik Widmer for the organization of this event, everything ran smoothly and was perfectly coordinated.