eth-zurich
(5)
Sunflower Labs
Sunflower Labs builds the Beehive - a fully autonomous, AI-powered drone security system for large outdoor properties. Its 'Bee' drone lives inside a weatherproof 'Hive' base station, launches within seconds of a triggered sensor, patrols a property while avoiding obstacles in nearly any weather, streams HD and thermal video, then returns to recharge on its own. Founded in 2016 and based in Zurich and San Francisco, the company pitches drones as a lower-cost, faster-responding alternative to human security patrols for industrial sites, commercial campuses, and high-value residential properties.
Patrick Bowen
Patrick Bowen is co-founder and CEO of Neurophos, an Austin-based startup building optical AI accelerator chips around metamaterial-based photonic tensor cores. A Duke PhD in electrical engineering and ETH Zurich master's grad, he previously co-founded Metacept with his Duke advisor David Smith. In January 2026 Neurophos closed a $110M Series A led by Gates Frontier with Microsoft's M12, Aramco, Bosch and others.
Elio Assaf
Elio Assaf is the Lebanese co-founder and CEO of Optiverse AG, a Zurich-based AI startup building a meeting assistant that turns everyday conversations into structured, operational intelligence - automating notes, summaries, transcriptions and CRM updates. A computer-vision and machine-learning researcher who worked across ETH Zurich, MIT and EPFL and previously engineered AI at Thales, he incorporated Optiverse in June 2024, won a CHF 150,000 Venture Kick award, and grew the platform to serve over 1,000 businesses worldwide while users report saving an average of 6.8 hours a week.
Lukas Hackl
Lukas Hackl is the co-founder and CEO of Aepnus Technology, an Emeryville, California startup building electrolyzers that turn sodium sulfate waste - a salty byproduct piling up across the EV battery supply chain - back into the sulfuric acid and caustic soda that battery makers have to buy. The technology grew out of his UC Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory PhD work on electrochemical water desalination. After hearing the same waste complaint on road trips from California to Canada, he and co-founder Bilen Akuzum turned a laboratory curiosity into a company that emerged from stealth in 2024 with $8 million in seed funding led by Clean Energy Ventures.
Nida Farid
MIT and ETH Zürich-trained aerospace engineer who worked on Airbus programs before pivoting to children's literature and energy policy consulting. She is the author of 'The Extraordinary Life of Riz' and the founder of savejoules.com.