Never before have so many companies been founded in Switzerland as were last year. This was recently reported by the economic news agency Dun & Bradstreet. ETH Zurich confirmed this trend and can once again look back on a successful year of spin-offs, which, according to Roland Siegwart, Vice President Research and Corporate Relations, “emphatically demonstrates that ETH Zurich has been able to establish an efficient, sustainable channel for technology transfer”.

The 22 new spin-offs are active in a wide range of areas: five companies deal with information and communications technology, seven are in the consulting and services branches, three in mechanical engineering, two each in medical devices and electrical engineering, and one each in chemical processes, biotechnology and pharma, and sensors/analytics. Just as varied as these areas are the countless applications being addressed; for example, one spin-off is developing fibre-optic monitoring solutions for geotechnical applications, and another specialises in visual speed sensors that can be applied not only to vehicles but also to people.

In 2011, independent organisations evaluated the business models and successful operations of ETH spin-offs and recognised their efforts with a number of awards. ETH spin-offs received prize money last year amounting to almost CHF 1 million.

For more information please read the press release in full or go to www.transfer.ethz.ch