Winning Digital Solutions for Biodiversity

The sustainability sector faces the interconnected challenges of climate change and biodiversity loss, threatening the preservation of sustainable habitats. Digital solutions will play a vital role in supporting the conservation of biodiversity, paving the way for a more sustainable future.

To accelerate innovative and technological solutions, established organisations with extensive experience can support startups and scaleups by providing resources, expertise, and mentorship. This is why digitalswitzerland has launched the #Biodiversity Digital Academy. This initiative aims to foster an innovative ecosystem by bridging the gap between well-established partners, industry experts, and ten promising Swiss startups committed to driving innovative solutions for biodiversity conservation.

The #Biodiversity Digital Academy was inaugurated in May 2023 through an open call for applications from Swiss biodiversity startups and scaleups. An expert jury identified the ten most promising and leading startups and scaleups to participate in the Academy. By the end of June, each of the participants will be matched with a suitable mentor from the expert panel, consisting of industry representatives from SAP, Samsung, Wipro, Bluerain Partners, Lidl, and the Noah Conference. Over the course of six months between July and December, these participants will benefit from workshops, mentorship programmes, networking events, and bootcamps designed to create synergies between industry experts and startups that foster digital solutions. The culmination of this journey will be the participation of all startups in the Noah Conference, accompanied by the publication of an open innovation whitepaper featuring their work.

For a sneak peek at the innovative solutions that will drive biodiversity conservation in the future, let us introduce you to the ten selected leaders from the Swiss startup ecosystem.

CyberTracker Conservation is a non-profit Public Benefit Organisation that promotes the vision of a worldwide environmental monitoring network.

Inverto provides technology that allows scalable wetland restoration through the automated remote collection of samples to companies sponsoring climate and biodiversity impacts.

Open Forest Protocol (OFP) is a scalable open platform that allows forest projects of any size to measure, report, and verify (MRV) their forestation data.

Nomica is a novel blockchain-based platform that values previously untapped ecosystem services.  

PORINI Solutions is a Swiss company building a bridge between innovative technology and conservation, with a special focus on the DLT / blockchain space.

rrreefs is a startup dedicated to the preservation of our planet’s coral reef, offering reef regeneration as a service to businesses with ambitious targets for nature.

SimplexDNA provides next-generation sequencing solutions for environmental monitoring, enabling biodiversity assessments with high accuracy and resolution.

Stream Ocean is changing the way we understand and assess changes in our oceans.

THE ARK helps to accelerate your impact with its digital platform and gives investors access to biodiversity and nature conservation investment opportunities. It uses verified data sets to scale conservation efforts and ensures effectiveness of capital allocation and drives investment decisions.

Xilva creates a global digital marketplace for forests – bringing transparency, ease and innovation to the deployment of capital.

Clara Wrede, Sustainability Project Manager