“Anything can happen with a startup, even after eight years.”

Some startups are founded almost by accident – a happy coincidence of opportunity, know-how and enthusiasm. Bestmile, a company that provided real-time management systems for vehicle fleets, was one of these. “I was highly active in student clubs during my time at EPFL and served as president of AGEPoly,” says Gindrat. “I knew I wanted a career that’s off the beaten path, but starting a business wasn’t my primary goal.” That was back in 2014, when EPFL was involved in two EU-funded research projects on self-driving cars. “Yet nobody was looking at fleet management,” says Gindrat. “We came up with an idea for an online platform designed specifically for this purpose.” He and his colleague Anne Mellano turned this idea into a new business and captured the first-mover advantage.

Bestmile grew quickly from a startup to a scale-up and won numerous awards. The firm signed contracts abroad – including in the UK, France, the Czech Republic and the US – and completed sizable funding rounds. A $16.5 million investment in 2019 suggested a bright future for the young company. But the pandemic hit in 2020: travel ground to a halt and transport companies put the brakes on their activities. All of Bestmile’s biggest contracts were terminated.

“We fought tooth and nail to find a way to save our company,” says Gindrat. This period lasted for over nine months, during which the cofounders even looked for a firm to buy Bestmile. “A lot of companies expressed an interest, but many of them had suspended their expansion plans owing to the pandemic and weren’t in a position to make this kind of decision quickly. One company made a very attractive offer in the spring of 2021, but changed its mind the day before the agreement was to be signed.” At that point, bankruptcy was inevitable. “We felt as if all our hard work had gone to waste,” says Gindrat. “It was a really tough time.”

There’s huge untapped potential for innovation. Master’s graduates generally end up working for large companies, even though two-thirds of Switzerland’s economy consists of SMEs.

Looking back on the start-up experience ten years later, he feels that creating Bestmile was a smart move at the time. “The self-driving car industry didn’t take off as fast as many people had expected,” he says. “That said, if I had to make the decision all over again, I’d still go forward with the company. It was the right market opportunity and the right time.”

Supporting profitable businesses

Gindrat bounced back quickly from the setback. After spending nearly ten years mapping out financial and tech-development strategies, hiring staff, managing a team and fighting the fires inherent in any new business, he had acquired a handy collection of skills.

“At Bestmile, our core business was based on computer programs, but none of the cofounders had a background in coding,” says Gindrat. “That forced us to build up a team rapidly so that we could focus on strategy, marketing and fundraising.” This was quite unusual for the deeptech space, where companies are generally founded by engineers who are passionate about the technology that they helped develop and hire other people to handle the commercial aspects.

In looking for new opportunities, Gindrat found that the skillset he’d acquired from his hands-on experience as an entrepreneur – and that wasn’t formally backed by a diploma – didn’t fit in any of the boxes used by corporate hiring teams. “Job posts are generally intended for people specialized in a specific area such as HR, finance or strategy,” he says. “I had a whole range of skills, just no particular specialization. I couldn’t find any job descriptions that matched my experience. So I tried to ‘create my own job’ by offering my skillset to potential employers.” In the end, Gindrat stayed true to his free spirit, deciding instead to start another business. This time his company is focused on offering advice and support to SMEs whose products are already on the market. This helps avoid the risks associated with getting a startup off the ground.

“One of my cofounders was actually the first investor in Bestmile,” says Gindrat. “Our new company, called Nuavo, acquires and advises profitable small- and medium-sized businesses that still have considerable growth potential.” They set up Nuavo a year ago and just acquired their first company. “We take a long-term view,” says Gindrat. “Our approach involves supporting companies’ management teams by giving them fresh energy and new ideas. We work hand in hand to help take their businesses even further.”

Making SMEs more attractive to new graduates

One of Nuavo’s medium-term goals is to make small businesses more attractive to young graduates on the job market. “There’s huge untapped potential for innovation,” says Gindrat. “Master’s graduates generally end up working for large companies, even though two-thirds of Switzerland’s economy consists of SMEs.” He also points out that graduates are often unaware of the opportunities available at small businesses, since these firms typically don’t invest in recruiting from universities. Nuavo intends to tackle this problem by making SMEs an attractive career choice for young graduates.