We have certainly all heard about Web3 and Metaverse, it is not only discussed in professional circles, even the yellow press reports about it. But what makes the tabloids tick is that they only report on negative events and like to water them down. Web3 offers us many new experiences and possibilities, from NFTs to virtual experiences, learning & education and the connection of reality and virtual spaces.

What is Web3?

Picture: https://femaleonezero.com

“The premise of ‘Web 3.0’ was coined by Ethereum co-founder Gavin Wood shortly after Ethereum launched in 2014. Gavin put into words a solution for a problem that many early crypto adopters felt: the Web required too much trust. That is, most of the Web that people know and use today relies on trusting a handful of private companies to act in the public’s best interests.”

There is no clear definition of web3, but the following basic principles apply:

• Decentralized – creator is owner
• Entitlement-free – no one is excluded
• Native means of payment – instead of outdated infrastructures of banks and payment service providers 
• It does not need trust – it works with incentives

In the web3, when someone creates or buys something and it becomes their property, they own it. If you buy an in-game item in a game in web2, you can use it in that game, and only as long as that game exists. In web3 it belongs to you and you can use it in the whole web3. This ownership is made possible by NFTs and you can also sell or trade it again. 

What is Metaverse?

The term metaverse was first used in the science fiction novel “Snow Crash” by Neal Stephenson, published in 1991. In it, the author describes the metaverse as a kind of global virtual reality in which people walk around as avatars. 

A basic definition of metaverse “remains elusive, fanciful and decades away” comes from venture capitalist Matthew Ball, who also published this essay in 2020.

Stefan Luber defines the Metaverse as “a vision for a shared online world. In it, the virtual world, augmented reality, and the physical world merge. For the users, there are extensive possibilities for interaction. They move with their digital identity in a common virtual space without internal borders.” So, you can really see it as a virtual reality where you move with your digital identity.

Why are this organizations in the top 10 in Switzerland?

In order to create a list of the most important web3 organizations in Switzerland, some criteria have to be used for evaluation. The organizations must be domiciled in Switzerland, be operational, have an active website, be active in the field of web3 and bring added value to everyone in web3. 

Why Switzerland exactly? Because the laws here provide legal certainty for companies in the blockchain sector, and a broad-based ecosystem has been created. “Regulation is a benefit, not a bug” has already been partially implemented in Switzerland. I personally find the organizations mentioned important in web3, but this is not a ranking.

Ethereum Foundation

Ethereum Foundation is a non-profit organization and provides support for the development of the Ethereum Blockchain and for applications in this ecosystem. Ethereum is the level 1 blockchain that enables smart contracts and NFTs. The founder, Vitalik Buterin, is a household name to anyone involved in blockchain or cryptos. He has been in the news a lot lately because Ethereum has made the transformation from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake, requiring much less energy.

Metaverse Talks

MetaverseTalks is a leading platform where Metaverse & NFT thought leaders and interested parties come together to promote and disseminate ideas worldwide. MetaverseTalks was founded by David Bundi and Cedric Ming to make the Metaverse understandable to all. All events can be found at metaversetalks website. For their events they get people from the web3 environment to share their knowledge with others. A very special event in a small setting was the MetaverseTalk in the unpaired.gallery in Zug with David Bundi, Cedric Ming, Judith Seipold, Denes Robert Fantasny and Georg Lanzinger who gave an insight into the world of NFTs in a panel discussion and fireside chat.

Picture: Georg Lanzinger

Kuble

Kuble develops 360° Web3 strategies in which NFTs, metaverse, community, gamification, governance & tokenomics and web2 can be important components. In terms of metaverses, they are agnostic. They conceptualize, 3D model and program – where possible – for both centralized and decentralized metaverses. They build gamifications and wearables, integrate NFTs into metaverse experiences or implement NFT use cases without metaverse.

Cosmos

Cosmos is an open-source project that aims to build a decentralized network of independent blockchains that can interoperate with each other. The Cosmos project is based in Zug, Switzerland. The Proof-of-Stake Blockchain has ATOM tokens, which can be tokenized and rewarded with ATOM. The developers Jae Kwon and Ethan Buchman, the founders of Cosmos, met for the first time in 2015 at the CryptoEconomicon conference in Silicon Valley and began developing Cosmos.

Dfinity

Dfinity is a non-profit organization works on the development of the decentralized cloud computing platform. The foundation has its headquarters in Zurich. It was founded in Palo Alto in 2016 by Dominic Williams.

The goal of Dfinity is to create a gigantic virtual computer consisting of a decentralized network of computers connected via blockchain. Based on this cloud, applications are to be created in the future, called “mega apps”. One of these is LinkedUp, an open-source alternative to LinkedIn.

Defire

There are many podcasts, but Defire is a Swiss podcast in English that deals with web3 and regularly interviews interesting people, which is also very successful, I can recommend this one. About every 2 weeks a new podcast comes out, the topics are very diverse, current topics like SBF, or NFT trading. He interviewed NFT experts such as @Fulowa and covers topics like security or how to keep your Bitcoin safe with a hardware wallet.

CasperLabs

Casper Blockchain is the first live proof-of-stake blockchain based on the Casper CBC specification. Casper is designed to accelerate the adoption of blockchain technology by enterprises and developers, and to adapt to future user needs. Headquartered in Zug, it was founded in 2018 by Medha Parlikar and Mrinal Manohar. Casper has some best cases to its credit, Metacask, a digital marketplace for premium whisky’s, runs on Casper.

As mentioned at the beginning, these are just a few of the many great web3 organizations in Switzerland. If you think of a particular organization that should be mentioned here, please contact me Georg Lanzinger.