Meet Andi Sonderegger...
As of today (Feb 1st) we will have a new ETH Intern joining our team! And not to be confused with the 5 other Andreas that work/worked at swissnex, he will go by Andi. Let's learn more about him...
Name: Andi Sonderegger
Hometown: Zurich, Switzerland
Languages spoken: German, English, Spanish, French
First time to US?: No, I have attended a language School in San Diego, CA in 2004.
Before swissnex: MSc in Exercise Physiology at ETH Zurich, Brand Coach for adidas, Teaching Assistant, Personal trainer, Soccer coach…
Favorite Sports/Hobbies: Soccer, Tennis, Graphic Design, Collecting Music...
What he wants to do here: Learn about a lot of different fields of science and culture and work with a young and dynamic team
When asked about his quirks... I love to cook and I’m very bossy in the kitchen.
So come over to swissnex Boston and hopefully Andi will help improve your soccer skills while cooking you something delicious!
Uni Basel & Boston: Where Science meets Art
On January 19, 2012, swissnex Boston hosted the first University of Basel Alumni evening in Boston, welcoming many former Basler students from the area. Both cities, Basel and Boston, are hot spots for art and life science. With this in mind, the evening centered around connecting the two topics.The speaker of the event was Martin Oeggerli, who holds a doctorate degree in molecular biology from the University of Basel.
Oeggerli cannot be seen as a regular photographer, because his objects are invisible to the naked eye, creating images with the help of a scanning electron microscope. Therefore he opens a whole new perspective on various organisms.
After hearing his great and impressive speech, the audience had the chance to meet other alumni and create new contacts far from Basel. We hope it isn’t the first and last University of Basel Alumni evening and we are looking forward to further Basler networking possibilities.
Thank you for coming and turning this event into a highlight. -University of Basel
Canton Fribourg explores opportunities in the Boston area
Canton Fribourg has bet on innovation for its long term economic development policy. As part of that strategy, a delegation led by Beat Vonlanthen, Minister of Economic Affairs of the Canton and representatives of the University and the College of Engineering and Architecture visited the Boston area. On their agenda: discussing best practices with local practitioners of the innovation ecosystem.
The delegation arrived with a focus on improving the concept of the future zero-carbon technology park that will be built on the site of the Cardinal brewery in downtown Fribourg. To create the best park and position Fribourg at the forefront of innovation in sustainable architecture, the delegation was very interested in discovering the local institutions and companies’ best practices. What are the success models of incubators? How to incentivize all the players of an innovation ecosystem to collaborate? How to enhance Fribourg’s innovation assets around a new branding strategy? These were just a handful of questions during the delegation’s visits to the Cambridge Innovation Center, the Gateway Park in Worcester, the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard, MassChallenge, the MOITI and the Fraunhofer Center for Sustainable Energy Systems.
Another objective of the visit was to deepen the academic presence of the Fribourg colleges and universities in Massachusetts. To this end, the delegates of the University of Fribourg and the College of Engineering visited the campus of the Worcester Polytechnics Institute to expand an already existing collaboration between WPI and the School of Business Administration-Fribourg.
Last but not least, their visit was an unique occasion for swissnex Boston to gather more than thirty alumni from the University of Fribourg or people having spent some time in the Fribourg area for the first Fribourgissima night in Boston. Created under the aegis of the Chamber of commerce Fribourg and the State Fribourg, Fribourgissima aims to connect a large network of people from Fribourg or active in the canton at some point in their life and now living around Switzerland and all over the world.
ENET Tweetup: “Landing your first customer” at swissnex Boston
On January 18, I had the pleasure of organizing the inaugural tweetup for ENET, the IEEE Boston Entrepreneurs’ Network, hosted here at the Swiss Consulate. ENET has been helping tech startups in the Boston area for over 20 years with education, networking, and innovative programs. As the startup ecosystem has shifted over the past few years from the 128 belt to Cambridge, ENET has moved with it, maintaining a strong base in the suburbs with meetings in Waltham, but adding programming in the city, where so many of the hottest startups are based. We’ve added tweetups to our more formal panel discussions, and swissnex Boston was gracious enough to provide the venue for our first one.
An energized crowd gathered on a cold January evening last week to kick off the tweetup season to hear Suzanne McDonald, founder of Designated Editor, on everybody’s favorite topic: how to acquire your vital first customers. Suzanne presented on practical, doable ways for startups to market their products, touching comprehensively on content marketing, SEO, social media, and product strategy. Audience members came prepared with their questions, which Suzanne answered with her characteristic humor and insight. Networking before and after the talk brought together senior professionals from so many worlds, including software, hardware, arts, nonprofits, and media. Students and recent grads on their first startup swapped stories with people on their third exits. It was an exhilarating evening of learning and connections.
Christina J. Inge
Vice-Chair, Alliances & Director of PR and Marketing
ENet: The IEEE Boston Entrepreneurs' Network
A showcase of Swiss Career Opportunities
Do research in Switzerland
Switzerland has a worldwide reputation for doing top-notch research, attracting the best talents and offering state-of-the-art infrastructure. Researchers not only find a complementary environment for their work, but also benefit from the high living standard and the cultural diversity in Switzerland. Hence, it is not surprising that many researchers, especially many Europeans, are looking for opportunities to go (or return) to Switzerland.
With this in mind, Katja Wirth of EUresearch was invited to swissnex Boston to provide those researchers interested in academic careers in Switzerland with an overview of the tools available to researchers abroad. Following the “technical” details of funding instruments, Evelin Geiser, a Swiss MIT post-doc, shared her view on the cultural differences of doing research in Switzerland and the USA.
The 20 graduate students and post-docs learned that there are primarily two funding agencies that offer interest programs to attract young talents from abroad. First, the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF), the only research granting council in Switzerland, recently launched the Ambizione program. This program provides 40 – 50 per year grants for up to three years to Swiss researchers abroad, or foreign junior researchers who wish to conduct as a research associate and independent research project at a Swiss university.
For short time stays, SNSF also offers the International Shorts Visits program that supports foreign researchers who come to Switzerland for one week to three month to initiate, or consolidate, collaborations with Swiss colleagues.
Second, Ms. Wirth also pointed to the funding opportunities of the European Union, highlighting two specific programs. On the one hand, there is the ERC Starting Independent Researchers Grant that provides support for individual researchers from all disciplines, focuses on interdisciplinary and adopts a bottom-up approach. On the other hand, the International Incoming Fellowship (IFF) of the Marie Curie Actions targets researchers with PhD, of any nationality and with at least four years of full-time research experience. The next call for grants will be published in March 2012.
Swiss Life Sciences Night
This past Friday, swissnex Boston kicked off the second annual Swiss Life Sciences Night. In conjunction with Roche, EU Research, Uni Zurich, Uni Basel, EPFL and ETH, swissnex’s Cambridge office was transformed into a lively, interactive career and academic fair.
The event drew in a diverse mix of students, mostly postdoctoral and master, studying and working at local universities and institutions. Armed with informational pamphlets and impressive resumes, the students were eager to discover the current possibilities in Switzerland:
“I am interested in Switzerland because I think it’s a very good country and I’ve heard there’s a lot of companies and a lot of good universities to continue my research there,” explained Anna, PhD candidate in chemistry.
“[I would] like to return to Switzerland. Love the country, the people and the life standard. I think the science is great there; they have a lot of opportunities,” Sandra, postdoctoral candidate at Dana Farber.
Along with the companies' and universities' presentations, the Swiss Life Sciences event featured a Job Board, filled with various opportunities and postings available in Switzerland from MyScience.ch.
swissnex Boston would like to thank Roche, EU Research, Uni Zurich, Uni Basel, EPFL and ETH for a successful Swiss Life Sciences night. We hope that this event has helped many students discover the next step in their career. For more information on any of the schools or organizations mentioned in this post feel free to email Sebasiten Hug, swissnex Boston Project Leader.
Attracting brains to Europe: The MIT European Career Fair
The 16th MIT-European Career Fair took place on January 21 – 23, 2012, attracting several thousand young talents from all over North America looking for opportunities in industry and academia in Europe. What started as a grassroots initiative evolved over the years to a platform, not only for European employers and universities, but also for the European Commission. This fact was highlighted this year by the visit of the EU Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science, Ms. Maire Geoghegan-Quinn, who gave the keynote speech at the Destination Europe- Conference, which was held the day before the fair. This conference, organized by the European Commission, featured other high-level speakers, such as ERC Secretary General Donald B Dingwell, and Nobel Prize Winner Tim Hunt. Its main message was that Europe continues to invest in research and innovation even in times of austerity and, thus, it is serious in its ambition to compete for the best scientific talent worldwide. While the conference conveyed an important political message, the MIT European Career Fair allowed for face-to-face interactions with students and researchers.
Like the previous fairs, swissnex Boston was present with its own booth, surrounded by a strong Swiss presence, including multinational companies such as Roche, ABB, ETH Zurich, EPFL, University of Basel, EUresearch and the Life Science Zurich- who participated for the first time! The most prominent guest at the swissnex Boston booth was EU Commissioner Geoghegan-Quinn, who expressed her hope to visit Switzerland’s top research facilities soon. Whether it was about open academic positions, living costs, research funding opportunities or working at swissnex Boston, many others seized the opportunity to speak to the swissnex Boston team.
The MIT-ECF weekend clearly illustrated the fact that young talents are more mobile than ever; one must not speak of brain gain or brain drain, but of brain circulation. Switzerland, in this respect, is a country with a strong reputation for excellent research and a high living standard.
French organizations partner to raise money for Haitian community
More than 120 guests gathered at swissnex to network with the French community and bring their support to starting a French class for the Haitian community. Thanks to their generosity, a new class will be open starting in 2012. The event was a wonderful show of collaborative work among several organizations.
A small team from Boston Accueil worked with Chef Bernard Ploteau to create an exquisite series of hors d’oeuvres and desserts. To add to the excitement, guests were invited to participate in a raffle, and one lucky person won a bottle of champagne!
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swissnex cared for the logistics and the organization while the main partner, EFGB (Ecole Francaise of Greater Boston) reached out to various groups and brought a wonderful audience together.
For more information on the Boston Accueil or the Ecole Francaise of Greater Boston, please visit their websites at: http://www.bostonaccueil.org/BA/BA.php and http://www.efgboston.org/
