Review into the year 2022
Dear EquityPitcher friends, family and partners
We look back "again", as it must be said, on an almost unimaginable year in terms of events. However, these have already been commented on extensively, so we will focus our annual review entirely on the events that EquityPitcher and our portfolio companies created themselves.
Portfolio Highlights
This year, too, we are pleased to report that the 22 companies with which we started the year were still active at the end of the year. Given the macroeconomic changes, this is anything but a matter of course. We are even more pleased that our portfolio companies continued to grow successfully for the most part.
Our startups were able to achieve 80% "year on year growth on average. 6 of our companies achieved 3-digit growth in 2022! 15 of our companies achieved 7-digit revenues in 2022, 8 of them more than 3 million CHF and 2 even 2-digit million revenues.
External circumstances have made us reluctant to make new investments. The plan was that we would invest in 5 to max. 7 new companies in 2022. In fact, with Sinpex, CNC24 and Calingo, only 3 new companies found their way into our portfolio.
This is mainly due to the fact that many startups decided to "only" realize interim financing instead of the planned financing round. On the one hand, this is against the background that valuations in 2022 have undergone a very significant downward correction and, on the other hand, because the willingness to invest in new portfolio companies was generally very restrained.
However, the aforementioned interim financing was very much in demand. Mostly via a "Convertible Loan" the companies, which are developing positively, were able to secure the necessary capital inflows from their existing investors to extend their "runway" to at least 12-18 months. Thus, the startups can continue to grow and thus create the conditions for a successful financing round with the desired valuation. For the existing investors, this has the advantage that they could usually buy in again at a lower price. We as EquityPitcher have also participated in such interim financing for 5 of our portfolio companies.
Furthermore, we have reinvested in vestr and Lumiform, which despite the external circumstances were able to successfully execute their planned financing rounds and raise 10 MCHF and 6.5 MCHF of fresh capital, respectively. Mika also successfully closed its financing round with 10 MCHF of fresh capital.
In this context, we are also very happy and grateful to welcome new friends and partners in our circle of co-investors with Capnamic, Elevator ventures, Coparion, Future Industry ventures, Seedcamp and Venpace.
In total, approximately 40 MCHF of fresh capital flowed into our portfolio companies in 2022. Over the entire lifecycle, 170 MCHF have now been invested in them!
Once again, it would be beyond the scope of this year's review to go into detail about each individual company. However, we would like to remain true to our tradition and pay our respects to the companies and entrepreneurs who were honored for their achievements:
🏅 Sinpex has won the second place in the Early Stage category at the #fintechgermanyaward2022. Congratulations to the team!
🏅 Opinary has won the European Publishing Award in the category "Business Model"!
🏅 OnlineDoctor has won the Health-i-Award 2022!
🏅 ANYbotics secures 2nd place in the AIRA Challenge at ACHEMA 2022 with #ANYmal!
🏅 GUURU was awarded as one of the #TOP25Scaleups 2022!
🏅 rready AG was selected as one of the #TOP100SwissStartups2022!
🏅 RightNow Group was ranked in the list of the 1000 fastest growing companies in Europe 2022 by Financial Times!
🏅 vestr was chosen as the best "Portfolio Management Solution - External Supplier"!
🏅 Futurae was included in the CyberTech100 for the third year in a row as one of the most innovative CyberTech companies.
🏅 Pia Frey, founder of Opinary made it to the list of the most important digital thinkers!
We are very happy about the many successes of our startups as well as their founders and congratulate you once again!
You are the core of everything we do and it makes us very proud to see how you develop and defy all challenges!
About EquityPitcher
There were also various events in our own organization that are definitely worth mentioning in a review of the year:
Already at the beginning of 2022, we were able to announce that Andrea Buhofer would complete the management team around Hermann and Sascha as a partner. In May, our path led us from the west of Zurich to Binz, where we were able to move into our new offices.
In June, our annual Come Together took place. Again, we are pleased to see that this event is becoming more and more popular every year. With 150 participants we will soon have to think about changing the location or limiting the number of participants.
Prof. Dr. Joseph Jung (Alfred Escher biographer) literally inspired the guests with the pioneering spirit of Switzerland with his keynote speech.
With Tobias Reichmuth, Sylvie Mutschler v. Specht and Roland Siegwart we had a really great panel, which was moderated by our VRP Prof. Thomas Schmitt in his usual grand manner.
Another highlight for us was our first "Portfolio Exchange Day", where all our portfolio companies came together to exchange ideas on the topic of sales and the associated challenges. Again, we had great guest speakers in Tobias Häckermann, Bernd Schopp and Christof Roduner, who shared their experiences with our founders.
Probably the most important event for us as equity pitchers was celebrated on September 30, 2022 - the closing of our second fund. With a total volume of 45 MCHF AuM, we are extremely happy - also considering that the macroeconomic and geopolitical issues did not necessarily make fundraising easy.
Many thanks again to all investors who have put their trust in us and made this possible!
What remains for us to say?
In any case, we are happy to announce a great new additions to our team, Jack Gasser- we welcome you to the EquityPitcher family!
We spare ourselves and you an outlook on 2023, as the future seems to be unpredictable anyway. Therefore, we have simply made it our resolution to remain true to our principles and to continue to work with full enthusiasm, conscientiously and professionally, as well as to relentlessly pursue our goals - regardless of the external circumstances:
To find the best startups and support them in their goal to make the world a little bit better, to the best of our abilities!
Since this is only possible with and through you, dear investors, partners, advisors & startups, all our thanks go to you!
We are very much looking forward to experiencing everything that may come in 2023 together with you!
With warm regards
The EquityPitcher Team
Andrea, Aurelio, Hermann, Jack, Sascha und Vanessa
