Kaspar&: The Venture Leader Fintech providing a convenient and affordable way to invest

Meet Jan-Philip Schade, CEO of Kaspar&. The Fintech startup offers a financial technology app that simplifies saving and investing for users. In December, Jan-Philip and the other nine Swiss National Fintech Team members will fly to London on a business development and investor roadshow.

Name: Jan-Philip Schade
Location: St.Gallen
Nationality: German
Graduated from: University of St.Gallen (HSG)
Job title: Co-founder & CEO
Number of employees: 13
Money raised: CHF 5 Million
First touchpoint with Venturelab: 2020



After completing my PhD in Finance at the University of St.Gallen, Jan-Philip worked for several years in the asset management industry where he developed investment strategies mainly for Swiss pension funds. During this time, his co-founders and him realized that whereas they were able to build great investment strategies, most people don’t have access to them: it’s not a huge secret that 70% of all people don’t invest. This insight inspired them to start democratizing investing and saving, creating an easy and seamless wealth management solution for those who have not yet had the opportunity to start their journey into saving and investing. Jan-Philip has a passion for old British cars which is why he loves repairing and restoring his 1970s MG B.

Can you tell us who your product or solution helps, and how?
Our solution is designed to give mass-affluent clients access to professional saving and investment plans. The secret to our success lies in our seamless integration: clients can link their existing bank accounts and payment cards with Kaspar& to unlock our full range of services. With this setup, they can easily open tailored saving plans and contribute through recurring or one-time payments. Plus, we offer a unique feature—clients can round up every card payment, investing the spare change toward their personal financial goals automatically. Paired with our intuitive, easy-to-use app, saving and investing becomes as simple as buying a cup of coffee!

What market are you addressing and what is the potential of your startup in that market?
Naturally one would try to address clients directly within the B2C market. However, we have decided to go a different way and offer our service as a white-label solution for banks. Our product-as-a-service concept offers an entire investment app as well as all related services (incl. wealth management, risk management, KYC, rebalancing, regulatory compliance etc.). This way banks get an entire ready-to-use solution for which they only have to pay on an attractive use-per-client basis. By using Kaspar& banks can quickly distribute an innovative solution to their existing clients and convert existing customers into first-time investors without having to build or operate a solution themselves. With that in mind, we can reach millions of existing bank clients in Switzerland and abroad.

How and where did you come up with the idea for your startup?
Our vision of democratizing investing and saving for everyone was born during our time when we were still working in the asset management industry. However, the ‘how’ only materialized later, after we took the plunge and started our venture. The concept of combining top-ups with saving plans and creating an intuitive app that links various bank accounts evolved through an iterative process, rather than being a straightforward implementation.
 

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What do you expect from the Venture Leaders Fintech roadshow, and how will it help you achieve your vision?
For us, it is time to take the next step and evaluate potential chances abroad in Switzerland. Hence, we are looking for investors and possible first clients with whom we can bring Kaspar& into the next market.

What are your team’s key achievements to date?
Pivoting our business from our initial purely B2C centralized idea to our current B2B strategy was a huge effort. Both in technology as well as funding terms. However, we managed to stay on top of our development agenda and closed a large seed round this year with strong partners such as Avaloq which will now help us to focus on the next steps. 

What is the most challenging and rewarding aspect of being a founder?
I think both are the same: being entirely responsible for what I’m doing. Whereas it gives me the freedom to explore and pursue new ideas it can also be quite stressful when things don’t work out and you know that there is only one person who can solve it: yourself.

What is the most important lesson you have learned as a founder?
Be resilient.

What is your favourite productivity hack/tool and why?
The focus mode on my computer and phone. It helps me to concentrate on my work and turn all distracting notifications off (except for our dog, but that’s okay). 

What was your dream job when you were a child?
I wanted to be captain of a sailing yacht, ideally in Southern France. However, after spending two years in the Navy, I realized that going to university wasn’t a bad option either.