A top executive at Switzerland's principal stock exchange, SIX Swiss Exchange, has revealed the company will look to issue its own digital tokens as part of its forthcoming blockchain-powered digital exchange. The development was reported by financial news outlet Finews on May 6. The SIX Swiss Exchange sees roughly 5.2 billion Swiss Francs (CHF) (~$5.1 billion) in daily turnover, and has a market capitalization of over 1.67 trillion CHF ~($1.6 trillion). As previously reported, SIX unveiled its plans to launch a digital asset ecosystem, dubbed Six Digital Exchange (SDX), in July 2018. In today’s interview, Thomas Zeeb — head of …

The World Economic Forum (WEF) has teamed up with over 100 global supply chain and logistics leaders to standardize blockchain apps in the industry, the organization announced on May 1. The WEF, a Switzerland-based organization whose motto is commitment to “improving the state of the world,” has announced a new project called “Redesigning Trust: Blockchain for Supply Chains.” The project aims to form a broad multi-stakeholder community to co-develop interoperable blockchain applications in the logistics industry and to leverage an open-source toolkit to deploy blockchain responsibly, eliminating the hype around the technology. According to the press release, over 20 governments, …

‘Smart card’ crypto wallet manufacturer Tangem has received a $15 million investment from major Japanese financial services firm SBI Group, Cointelegraph auf Deutsch reports on April 24. The new investment will purportedly allow Tangem to relocate its headquarters to the ‘Crypto Valley’ of Zug, Switzerland. From Zug, Tangem want to develop new use cases for its physical smart cards that function like the hardware wallet version of banknotes. Each of these smart cards carries a fixed amount of cryptocurrency. The company intends for these smart cards to be used for daily crypto payments. Andrey Kurennykh, Tangem’s CEO said: “It is …

Blockchain tech giant Bitfury has partnered with a Swiss investment firm to release a dedicated bitcoin mining fund for institutional investors, executives confirmed on Twitter on April 24. Bitfury, which develops various blockchain-related software along with mining services, confirmed that Final Frontier, in which it holds a minority stake, had gained regulatory approval for the fund from neighboring Liechtenstein. Focusing on institutions, the fund will give major investors access to the world of bitcoin mining, with Bitfury describing its creation as beneficial for the emerging sector. Bitfury will provide the hardware for the project, which will also leverage the company’s …

Blockchain-focused company Swisscom Blockchain AG has onboarded Ethereum (ETH) engineer Lukas Hohl as its new chief executive officer, Cointelegraph auf Deutsch reported on April 15. Hohl, who previously served at various IT and finance companies, including Blockchain’s parent company Swisscom, business consulting firm BearingPoint, consultancy group Sofgen, and management consulting company Synpulse, will now lead the firm’s blockchain strategy and facilitate the further development of the company. Roger Wüthrich-Hasenböhler, chief digital officer at Swisscom, commented on Hohl’s appointment, saying that "in the past, Lukas Hohl has built and managed companies, managed complex large-scale projects, is well networked in Switzerland and …

Switzerland-based food giant Nestlé, French supermarket chain Carrefour and IBM have partnered to use the latter’s blockchain technology to track a famous French convenience food, the companies announced in a press release on April 15. Nestlé and Carrefour, both of which are members of IBM’s Food Trust blockchain platform, will use the technology from today to track the supply chain of Mousline, a well-known brand of instant mashed potatoes. Once it rolls out, shoppers will be able to scan a QR code with their smartphones to know exactly where the potatoes in a specific packet came from, as well as …

A subsidiary of Swiss cybersecurity and blockchain firm WISeKey has raised $7 million in an pre-funding round prior to launching a security token offering (STO), the company confirmed in a press release on April 11. WISeCoin, which came into being in August last year, plans to conduct the STO in Q2. Responsible for managing all of WISeKey’s blockchain initiatives and operations, the vertically-integrated platform intends to raise a total of 17,587,527 Swiss francs ($17,563,695) to expand its activities. These include the use of various disruptive technologies, specifically focusing on the Internet of Things (IoT) given WISeKey’s major presence as a …

It was rumbling in the beginning of February in Swiss Zug. The Crypto Valley Association (CVA) was undergoing a major reorganization. On Thursday, Jan. 31, the General Assembly of the Association elected former Swisscom manager Daniel Haudenschild as president of the CVA and the successor to Oliver Bussmann. The former CVA’s president, Oliver Bussmann, had announced last November — together with the members Vasily Suvorov, René Hüsler and Nicolas Schobinger — not to run for reelection at the General Assembly. The former SAP and UBS manager, who runs a consulting firm in Zug, had been controversial, according to media reports. …

Liechtenstein-based Bank Frick has issued an active Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH)-based tracker along with digital finance firm Bitcoin Suisse, the firm announced on April 9. Starting today, Bank Frick will offer institutional and qualified investors access to its BTC-ETH tracker, the certificates of which will take the form of both a classic security and a token, according to Bank Frick’s press release. Within the new initiative, Bank Frick acts as issuer and will be responsible for issuing crypto certificates, which target qualified investors exclusively. In turn, Bitcoin Suisse acts as crypto broker and is responsible for the execution of …

Swiss blockchain-based insurance transaction platform B3i has expanded its group of investors in its ongoing funding round, according to a press release published on April 3. Per the release, B3i has added three new insurer and reinsurers to participate in the company’s current funding round. B3i notes in the announcement that the first phase of the product scheduled to be launched in the fourth quarter of 2019 is being evaluated, while invitations for the second wave of investors are being extended. Additionally, B3i formed a Board of Directors that includes nine senior executives of the investor companies. The chairman of …

Switzerland-based blockchain, Internet of Things (IoT) and cybersecurity firm WISeKey has acquired a 22 percent interest in American data infrastructure firm Tarmin through a multi-million USD transaction, exact amount unspecified. The news was revealed in an official announcement from WISeKey on April 3. WISeKey focuses on creating digital identity ecosystems that implement blockchain, AI and IoT technology for people and smart device, while Tarmin develops scalable data and software defined infrastructure for high-volume data management and secure storage. WISeKey’s agreement to acquire a 22 percent interest in the latter had been signed in the fall of last year. The investment …

Swiss food technology giant Bühler introduced two food safety products that can potentially integrate blockchain at the Microsoft booth at the Hannover Messe industrial event in Germany on April 1. The company reported the news in a press release published the same day. The so-called “blockchain-ready” products presented by the company are a tool aiming to reduce microbial contamination in dry goods, dubbed Laatu, and Tubex Pro, a scale system that self-optimizes and produces a constant flow of production data. Both solutions are connected to the Bühler Insights Internet of Things service, hosted on the Microsoft Azure cloud platform. The …