The fourth edition of the Kickstart acceleration program has set a new record this year. For the first time, 48 national and international tech growth startups and scale-ups from 17 countries were selected, in addition to nine corporate innovation teams (intrapreneurship teams). The selected startups provide cutting-edge solutions for a wide range of challenges across six verticals. From September to November 2019, the teams will work in Switzerland, where they seek innovation partnerships with corporations and organizations. Of the 48 startups, 14 are from Switzerland. These include; Food and Retail Tech Planted Foods - creates tasty "meat" directly from plants – and skips the animal. The plant-based meat is clean-label, sustainable, healthy and cruelty-free. PREMIUM energy - developed by SwissTOP: Their heritage is selected organic Alpine hemp which serves as the basis for a) energy-releasing high-protein shakes, b) liquid food for care & hospitals, c) meal replacement shakes, d) pioneering in the first plant-based meat products made with hemp. SwissDeCode - is transforming food safety by helping Farmers and Food Manufacturers to grow and produce food that is safe to eat. Fintech & Digital Assets Annanow - is an innovative last-mile delivery service that connects products with people in insurance and beyond Assetyze - supports you with unlocking the full potential of dormant, tangible assets such as art, classic cars or other precious collectables. atpar - Banking-grade finance for blockchain. Atpar enables a global and frictionless financial market infrastructure. Contract Vault - has developed an AI and blockchain-powered end-to-end document, contract and workflow creation, management and automation platform that enables new categories of agreements and makes every step of the document lifecycle massively more efficient. Taxdone - helps people do their taxes in 5 minutes, with smart questions and the right deductions – starting with Zurich. EdTech Taskbase - offers AI-based, easy-to-integrate modules that enable existing learning solutions to adapt learning paths to each student’s specific needs through our ability to automatically score complex exercises and give personalized didactic feedback. Healthtech Nahtlos - offers a comfortable and easy to use Smart Textile electrocardiogram (ECG) solution for long-term monitoring of the heart's activity. OneDoc - is a Swiss platform to find a doctor, dentist or therapist and book medical appointments online. Smart City & Technology AirBie - is promoting bike-sharing as a means of transportation. They have developed a smart bike lock (with GPS), which fits any bike, such that anyone can create a bike-sharing fleet in a few minutes and manage it with their smart city analytics software. Oxygen at Work - improves the air quality in office spaces combining natural plants with modern technology in order to improve the health of the employees and reduce the energy consumption of buildings. Totemi - is a complete solution to create unique urban customer experiences. Thanks to its robust, autonomous (up to 7 years) and identifiably connected signage, TOTEMI brings a new form of discovery and commitment for the users of a city.(RAN)Photo: Thomas Lüthi, Ringier