The Champions Programme offers a grant of CHF 100,000, enabling exceptional minds and teams to focus on market adaptation, acquiring initial customers, and establishing the foundation for their startups. The programme emphasizes technical projects that incur higher costs for prototype and MVP development or securing intellectual property, ensuring the journey toward market readiness. Close mentoring and integration with the HSG community provide comprehensive support
Carmel Imhof is the Founder and CEO of ZoneIn, a digital health startup dedicated to transforming the mental health care experience by improving connections between patients, therapists, and doctors. A graduate of the University of St.Gallen in Business Administration and Accounting & Finance, Carmel brings strong business acumen, empathy, and determination to tackling mental health challenges.
Henry Müller is a Ph.D. candidate in Management at the University of St.Gallen, specializing in sustainable entrepreneurship. As the co-founder and CEO of fortyfour, Henry develops a groundbreaking Direct Air Capture (DAC) technology that converts atmospheric CO₂ into valuable industrial feedstock for agriculture and the chemical industry. This innovation offers a clean and cost-efficient alternative to traditional fossil-based sources, addressing decarbonization challenges across industries.The programme focuses on facilitating knowledge and technology transfer and aims to help innovative business ideas successfully enter the market. It supports the commercialisation of HSG-driven business cases through either a tech-push or market-pull approach, with the goal of establishing a strong and sustainable product-market fit and achieving market traction.
This track supports HSG students working on innovative, technology-driven startup projects. It is designed to help founders establish their companies and professionalise their business models in order to gain initial market traction. Projects should have a validated proof of concept and a realistic path to market within 12 months. The focus is on bridging the gap between technological innovation and market readiness by refining the go-to-market strategy, validating customer segments, and strengthening the business foundation.
This track supports HSG students in advancing business ideas that demonstrate strong market potential and initial traction. The focus is on refining and developing the product or service in order to achieve a sustainable product-market fit. Participants work on validating the technical feasibility, conducting user validation, and improving the scalability of their solutions to ensure alignment with real market demand and long-term viability.
Application Video (max. 2 min) with a presentation of the business idea and the HSG entrepreneur (grant recipient).
Pitch Deck: Venture Concept with a description of the business idea, problem-solution fit, proof-of-concept, current status, next steps, and development goals with a simple financial plan.
Full CV (including list of publications if applicable); clearly state education and employment start/end dates (at least month and year).
One-page motivation letter outlining the entrepreneurial motivation.
Supporting documentation (e.g., confirmation of defence date for PhDs, transcripts for Master’s candidates).
Recommendation letter from an academic supervisor, if applicable.
Declaration of other non-financial grants / support projects related to the business idea (if there are any).
The application period for the Entrepreneurial Champions Programme has closed. The new cohort has been selected. Information about the next application round will be published on this page in due course.