32 structured questions across 7 sections. Some answers shape your public profile, others stay private and only feed your Selection Score. Each question is marked accordingly. Plan one uninterrupted session — the assessment cannot be saved as a draft.
Time & Cohort.
Two anchors that set your evaluation context. Company age is computed automatically and used for age-normalised scoring.
The reporting year for this assessment. Pre-filled — you usually won't need to change it.
The year the legal entity was incorporated. Used for age-normalised peer comparison — early-stage startups are not compared against scale-ups.
Identification & Stage.
The basics that define your public-facing identity. All of A1 appears on your profile.
Your legal entity name as registered. This is the headline of your public profile.
Where your team is primarily based. Founders search by city — this matters for visibility.
Your main public website. Will be linked directly from your published profile.
This determines your peer cohort for ranking. Early ≈ Pre-revenue or first paying customers · Growth ≈ Scaling revenue, expanding · Scale-up ≈ Established revenue, international expansion.
Determines your sub-ranking cohort (Top FinTech, Top MedTech, Top Climate etc.). Choose the sector that best describes your primary market — not your technology type.
Used for the Spin-off sub-ranking. Select the institution where the core technology or founding team originated — or "Independent" if not applicable.
Full names of all active co-founders (including yourself). These appear on your public profile card. Add one per line.
Market & Business Model.
The basis for the Market & Scalability Index. Mix of public-facing identity and private scoring inputs.
The geographic reach you are actively targeting today (not where you might go in five years).
Total Addressable Market in CHF or EUR. Stays private — feeds the Market Index but never appears on your profile.
Select all that apply. Multiple selections welcome for hybrid models.
How clearly can you articulate what sets you apart from existing alternatives? 0 = "We're like X but cheaper" · 10 = "Defensible, hard-to-replicate moat".
Traction & Growth.
The basis for the Traction Velocity Index — age-normalised. Most fields are private to protect competitive information.
Customers currently paying you. Pilots and free trials don't count.
In CHF. Hardware/transaction businesses: use annualised revenue equivalent. Stays strictly private.
Year-over-year growth in revenue. If you're pre-revenue or under 1 year old, select < 20%.
Do you have at least one paying customer outside Switzerland?
Formal partnerships with corporates, distributors, or research institutions that materially affect your business.
The Team.
Team composition and depth. Public for size and team count, private for qualitative scores.
Number of co-founders actively involved today (full-time or near-full-time).
Total headcount including founders, full-time employees and committed part-timers.
How well do the team's skill sets complement each other? Low = significant gaps · High = full coverage of business + tech + commercial.
Combined depth of relevant industry experience across the founding team.
Active advisory board or formal board of directors with relevant expertise.
Used exclusively for the Female-led sub-ranking. This data is never published on your public profile — it is only used to determine eligibility for the dedicated sub-ranking cohort.
Technology & IP.
Basis for the Technology & IP Index. Tech type and maturity are public; R&D and regulatory complexity stay private.
Where is your core product today? Prototype = pre-launch · MVP = first version live · Market-ready = stable, documented · Scaling = serving multiple customer segments.
The strongest level of IP protection currently in place.
Share of total resources (people + budget) dedicated to research and development.
How regulated is your industry? Low = minimal compliance burden · High = MedTech, fintech, pharma-style approval cycles.
Financing & Capital Readiness.
Investor types are public for ecosystem visibility. Funding amounts, runway and round-readiness stay strictly private.
Total external capital raised to date — equity, convertible notes, grants. Excludes founder capital. In CHF.
Categories — not individual investor names. Select all that apply. Names of specific funds remain confidential.
How many months can you operate at current burn rate without new funding? Strictly private.
Where are you in the next funding round process?
How clearly defined is the planned deployment of next-round capital? 0 = "Hire and grow" · 10 = Specific milestones tied to specific spend buckets.
Profile media.
Optional supplementary content for your public profile. Strengthens visibility and recognition — does not affect your Selection Score.
Founders, investors and journalists scan profiles visually. A clear logo, a sharp tagline, and a product visual dramatically increase profile engagement. Skipping this section is fine — but adding even one image makes a measurable difference.
A short, founder-written one-liner. Appears directly under your startup name on your profile. Max 120 characters.
Two to three sentences explaining what you do, who you serve, and what makes you different. Plain language — investors and journalists read this first. Max 500 characters.
Square or near-square logo. Used in the directory grid, the search results, and at the top of your profile. SVG preferred for crisp rendering at all sizes.
A single representative image — product screenshot, hardware photograph, team picture, or technical diagram. This is the visual that appears across the top of your public profile and in editorial features. Choose one image that, on its own, communicates what you do.
Recommended: 1920 × 1080 px (16:9). Will be cropped at smaller sizes for thumbnails. Max 5 MB.
Your current investor deck. Used by ZHAW research staff for context only — never published, never shared with third parties. You can replace or delete it from your dashboard at any time.
Select any awards or programmes your startup has been recognised by. These appear as badges on your public profile and improve discoverability in the directory.
Ready to submit?
Once submitted, your responses are locked. You can update non-scored profile fields (logo, tagline, pitch description, hero image) from your dashboard at any time. The 32 scoring questions are fixed for this evaluation year.
Sensitive data beyond the published profile is never disclosed — your dashboard will show a private, detailed breakdown.