Next-Gen Deep Tech: Who’s Leading the Space?

The artificial intelligence (AI) boom is reshaping Europe’s priorities and positioning when it comes to investing in and developing advanced technologies. Two clusters have emerged in the region: “New Palo Alto,” centered around Cambridge, London, Paris, and Amsterdam, and the “Alpine Tech Cluster,” with Switzerland at its core. These clusters are home to a growing number of startups that are competing globally for venture capital (VC) investment.

Deep tech has taken over the startup world in recent years, now accounting for nearly one-third of Europeʼs VC funding. That is up 2.5x in the last decade, according to the Swiss DeepTech Report 2025 from Deep Tech Nation Switzerland.

While innovation hubs like Silicon Valley, Berlin, or Paris attract global attention, data from Dealroom.co and Startupticker highlights how Switzerland, in particular, is punching above its weight, playing a key role in the rapidly growing European technology market with the highest per capita deep tech venture capital funding on the continent.

What is deep tech, and how has a small country exempt from European Investment Fund (EIF) and European Union funding built such a strong ecosystem?

Table of Contents Table of Contents

1. Key Takeaways
2. Why Is Switzerland a Deep Tech Hotspot?
3. Swiss Precision Meets Machine Intelligence
4. Why Switzerland Rather Than Europe’s Other Tech Hubs?
5. Swiss Startups Join Robotics Revolution
6. The Bottom Line
7. FAQs
8. References

Show Full Guide

Table of Contents

1. Key Takeaways
2. Why Is Switzerland a Deep Tech Hotspot?
3. Swiss Precision Meets Machine Intelligence
Show Full Guide
4. Why Switzerland Rather Than Europe’s Other Tech Hubs?
5. Swiss Startups Join Robotics Revolution
6. The Bottom Line
7. FAQs
8. References

Why Is Switzerland a Deep Tech Hotspot?

First, what is deep tech? The term refers to technology that is based on engineering innovation or scientific advances and discoveries applied for the first time as a product, according to the report.

Deep technology takes a long time to reach market-ready maturity because of the complexity and novelty of the research and development (R&D) involved, which requires substantial investment. Companies that hold significant intellectual property (IP) and commercialize research innovations are more likely to be considered deep tech.

The next-generation deep tech market includes AI and machine learning (ML), which are on the rise in Switzerland, with robotics and biotechnology also growing fast.

Switzerland has traditionally been a global center for biotechnology development, but its startup pipeline has rapidly diversified beyond its biotech roots, according to the report.

Biotech still has the largest number of VC-backed startups and greatest historical contribution to enterprise value creation, but it no longer dominates Switzerland’s high-tech landscape.

AI/ML has accounted for 23% of newly founded deep tech companies in the country since 2021, almost double its share of 12% in the 2010–2020 period, reflecting rapid momentum in data-driven innovation.

Swiss Precision Meets Machine Intelligence

There are more than 85 VC-backed startups in Switzerland developing novel AI models and architectures, foundational models, novel AI tools, AI computing chips, and deep scientific AI applications, such as drug discovery and material discovery.

Such startups have raised around $768 million in VC funding since 2019, growing 98% in those five years. They have a combined enterprise value of around $2.7 billion.

“Switzerland stands at the forefront of global AI innovation, leading with the highest AI patents per capita and one of the most dynamic startup ecosystems,” Chris Keller, Managing Director Europe Central at AWS, stated in the report.

“In our AWS Zurich Region, we see customers from ETH [university] labs to global enterprises launching new generative AI workloads daily, showcasing how Swiss technical precision and deep AI talent drive rapid innovation. This powerful combination helps organizations of all sizes transform breakthrough AI concepts into production-ready solutions at scale.”

Nathan Benaich, Founding Partner at Air Street Capital, added:

“Zurich has quietly become an AI powerhouse. With a deep pool of world-class engineers and researchers, anchored by the likes of Google, Meta, Apple, and Microsoft, and increasingly ambitious academic communities driven by ETHZ, the city is a prime ecosystem for creating AI-first companies. Switzerland is also home to large-scale GPU computing resources and a renowned life sciences industry.”

Why Switzerland Rather Than Europe’s Other Tech Hubs?

ETH Zurich (ETH) and the Swiss Federal Technology Institute of Lausanne (EPFL) form an educational and research ecosystem that helps turn AI research into commercialized advancements.

They are two of the top four universities creating deep tech spinouts in Europe behind Oxford and Cambridge in the UK.

Alex Stöckl, Founding Partner at VC firm Founderful, told Techopedia:

“It is a combination of ETH and EPFL being considered amongst the globally leading schools in computer science, the density of global tech firms running engineering offices within a fairly small place (Google, Microsoft, Meta, Nvidia, Huawei, OpenAI, Anthropic, et al) and entrepreneurial mindset of professors in Switzerland, who are systematically encouraged to facilitate commercialization of academic research.”

Swiss Startups Join Robotics Revolution

Switzerland’s strength in developing AI is also contributing to its innovation in robotics hardware and software, ranging from humanoids, soft robotics, and novel actuators to robotics general intelligence and robotics training.

Prof. Marco Hutter, Director of the Robotic Systems Lab at ETH Zürich, stated in the report:

“Robots are rapidly expanding beyond factory floors, propelled by breakthroughs in AI and embodied intelligence. With learning-based mobility and manipulation, combined with LLM-powered common-sense reasoning, quadrupeds and humanoids are poised to transform industries ranging from logistics to inspection and construction.”

Hutter added:

“While the US and China have traditionally led the charge, Europe is gaining momentum. At the center of this movement is Switzerland, where deep tech talent, academic excellence, and capital converge, positioning the country as a key player in one of this century’s most transformative industrial revolutions.”

There are more than 55 VC-backed startups in the robotics space in Switzerland, which have raised around $606 million in VC funding since 2019 – growing 2,357% over five years. The startups have a combined enterprise value of around $2 billion.

“Switzerland launches the most robotics startups per capita, yet the opportunity still feels under-priced given the depth of the science base and concentration of both engineering talent and customers,” stated Archie Muirhead, Partner at IQ Capital.

He added:

“The ETH-EPFL corridor is unquestionably the leading robotics cluster in Europe… the standout common feature we have observed in Swiss robotics founders is a pragmatic, customer-driven approach – automation simply needs to work, reliably and cheaply.”

The Bottom Line

Switzerland has allocated 60% of its total venture capital to deep tech startups since 2019 – more than any other country globally. Over the same period, Switzerland ranked first in Europe and third worldwide for deep tech investment from VC funds per capita, backed by its strong domestic research base and increasing international capital.

Swiss deep tech companies have created more than $100 billion in combined enterprise value, led by innovative startups in AI/ML and robotics, along with biotech and medtech.

Swiss investors account for one-third of the capital in early-stage investments, but drop to only 4% of the capital in late-stage investments. Nearly 96% of late-stage rounds are led by global investors, predominantly from the US and EU. This points to a challenge in raising domestic capital, but an investment opportunity for international expansion.

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