Wingman Ventures dedicates a fund to student investments

Wingman Campus Fund, a new micro investment initiative entirely run by students, plans to invest in entrepreneurial student teams at ETH Zurich, EPF Lausanne and the University of St.Gallen (HSG). Next month, a first application call will open to recruit the students who will join the 1-year traineeship of the Wingman Campus Fund.

Wingman Ventures decided to support student entrepreneurs by launching a new investment program backing a total of 15 student teams per year at ETH Zurich, EPF Lausanne and the University of St.Gallen (HSG) at the earliest stages of their founders’ journey. With this investment program, Wingman Ventures intends to unlock more capital for student entrepreneurs, while supporting them with access to mentors and first corporate clients.

Wingman Campus Fund will be entirely run by students from the three universities, who will learn about venture capital investing as part of a 1-year traineeship. By doing so, Wingman Ventures aims to train the next generation of VC investors and student entrepreneurs coming from those universities and  will share its infrastructure, know-how and network to achieve that purpose.

The Fund will deploy CHF300k per year in 15 teams usually before incorporation of a company. The Campus Fund is to be profitable. “We are confident that the students we will train over the course of the year will make great investment decisions and thus trust them with fully autonomous decision-making. Dorm Room Fund and similar initiatives in the US have been highly profitable with follow on investments from world-leading VC firms, we don't see any reason why this shouldn't be the case in Switzerland”, explains Edouard Treccani, Head of partnerships and Wingman Ventures.

Next month, a first application call will open to recruit the students who will join the 1-year traineeship of the Wingman Campus Fund. The investment program will start operating in Fall 2021.

The concept is slightly different than the one of S2S, which we described in another article today, however both try to attract bright minds to the world of start-ups as founders or investors. That the two initiatives start to communicate about their achievements and plans and the same day is a coincidence but nonetheless telling. Investors are obviously convinced that there is huge untapped potential with regard to start-ups at Swiss universities.

(Press release / SK)