Visit: wemakeit

Founders:

Rea Eggli

Jürg Lehni

Johannes Gees

Founded when and where:

Zurich, January 2012

Short description (1-2 sentences):

wemakeit is Switzerland’s foremost crowdfunding platform and one of the largest in Europe. We provide infrastructure and knowledge that enables project initiators to advertise ideas and fund them through the crowd.

What we do:

Whether alone, a collective, an organization or a company – our crowdfunding platform allows for introducing projects to a large audience online and to finance these in a joint effort. At the same time, backers get to discover projects and help make ideas happen. To achieve this, we adopted an awards-based crowdfunding approach. In return for their contributions, backers get a remuneration that is not of a financial nature but a so-called reward. Through our partner programs, we give foundations, companies and banks the opportunity to embrace a new kind of sponsoring. Combining classic sponsoring and present-day crowdfunding, a new model emerges: Projects are selected for support according to criteria our partners themselves determine, which means support can be specifically tailored to certain regions, categories or subjects.

Next to our offices in Zurich, Basel and Lausanne, we are also present in Vienna, Berlin and Bellinzona. wemakeit speaks four languages (English, German, French, Italian) which allows us to reach an international community.

Markets:

Switzerland, Austria, Germany, Italy, France

Number of employees:

12 employees (with a total of 700 percent by position) plus freelancers and scouts

Funding:

1.1 Million CHF

Why Switzerland is a great place to be a fintech startup:

We found in Zurich some of the best designers, coders, marketing and sales people, as well as corporate partners and foundations to start our business – within walking distance from our office,. At the same time, Switzerland is one of the most interesting consumer markets, which makes it a perfect place to start a business.