Hidden Figures Award winners
Congratulations to all the winners and nominees of the Hidden Figures Award! Each individual recognised here has made a remarkable contribution in the tech field. To explore the achievements and stories of our past finalists and winners, browse the entries below.
These are the Hidden Figures Award winners 2023
Category: Empowered Women
Winner
Isaline Muelhauser
Finalists
Introduction finalists
Category: Startup / Innovation
Winner
Sabrina Badir
Finalists
Introduction finalists
Category: Non-Profit Organisation
Winner
Safia Agueni
Finalists
Introduction finalists
Category: Empowered Women
Congratulation to Isaline Muelhauser (Pilea.ch)
Isaline is one of the smartest women I ever met and she strongly believes in empowering women. As a result, many of her unpaid activities are related to that. She was able to become a very successful consultant in our domain. Her brain never stops and her capacity of analysis is clearly above average.
Isaline opened her own consulting company in SEO. However, in her “free time”. She works on SEOnerdSwitzerland which is an association that has a goal to make SEO knowledge accessible to everybody. What makes it special is not just the fact that it’s the largest SEO event in Switzerland but also that we work to make sure that women are visible. Her engagement for this is tireless. Moreover, she went an extra mile to make the association be also well-known in the Swiss German part of Switzerland. Making sure that she was able to have Swiss speakers in our in-person events.
Isaline is an SEO consultant and an entrepreneur running her SEO consultancy Pilea.ch since 2019, specializing in multilingual websites. Isaline navigates the tech and the entrepreneur fields with grace showing that it’s possible to grow a business beyond gender. Isaline is caring and attentive to her surroundings. She is both able to communicate her enthusiasm for her field of expertise as a public speaker and set a stage to support someone who is a speaker for the first time
Category: Startup / Innovation
Congratulations to Sabrina Badir (pregnolia AG)
Preterm birth is still one of the biggest challenges in modern obstetrics, not only in developing countries but also in developed countries. And as in many other areas of women’s health, innovation in antenatal care is progressing far too slowly.
This was Sabrina Badir’s motivation and incentive to act to help solve a problem that affects many pregnant women around the world. During her PhD at ETH Zurich, Badir developed a device that measures the stiffness of the cervix during pregnancy, an important parameter in assessing the risk of preterm birth.
After completing her PhD in biomechanics in 2015, she was awarded the Pioneer Fellowship to translate her academic research into a medical product and founded Pregnolia a year later. Badir’s vision is to use her medical device – the Pregnolia System – to create a new standard for detecting preterm birth to improve pregnancy care for millions of women around the world.
When she took on the role of CEO of Pregnolia, she was a scientist (and not yet an entrepreneur) who had no idea how to build a business. She had to acquire this know-how through various professionals and thus refined her excellent networking skills.
Her ability to convince investors and gain their trust, raise money and build a network of supportive doctors, clinics, midwives, health insurers and other stakeholders is her unique expertise.
Pregnolia AG, a spin-off of ETH Zurich, is now a Swiss medical technology company with 15 employees. The team around Badir has developed the world’s first CE-marked and patented medical device for measuring cervical stiffness.
Category: Non-Profit Organisation
Congratulations to Safia Agueni (Women in Tech Switzerla)
Switzerland, the home to numerous STEM giants, is also the abode of Safia, a dedicated computer scientist who now successfully leads a Global Tech program in a top pharma company, a mother of three and a Woman in Tech who generously lives to help other women rise in STEM.
Safia is founder and president of the Swiss Chapter of Women in Tech, an international organization with a double mission: to close the gender gap and empower 5 million girls and women to embrace fields linked to technology by 2030. Safia has played an exceptional role in the establishment and growth of the Swiss Chapter, which has so far not been acknowledged. Based on all of the above, Safia Agueni is an exceptional woman who deserves the recognition and honor of being nominated for the Hidden Figures Award 2023.
Category: Non-Profit Organisation
Congratulations to Anaïs Salson ( 42 Lausanne)
Anais is an absolutely amazing person, engaged on different levels to make a change in the society through tech and education. As head of partnership @42Lausanne, she made reality a new way of teaching tech to students from any backgrounds in Switzerland. She travelled extensively and is recognized for her expertise in several domains such as education, innovation management and digital transformation. She is multi-talented and also a professional photographer and story-teller. Her curiosity and vivacity, her people-centric approach, her amazing capacity of connecting dots and linking people enables her to always find new ways of doing things and empowering people. 42Lausanne is a break-through organization teaching tech in a completely new way: it is all about peer-work and review, no teachers, gamified curriculum – it is a paradigm shift in the way we imagine and design the future of teaching. She has been carrying this project since the beginning, without her passion, engagement and commitment, nothing would have been possible.
These are the Hidden Figures Award winners 2022
Category: Empowered Women
Winner
Sinja Christiani
Finalists
Introduction finalists
Category: Startup / Innovation
Winner
Sanjana Rao
Finalists
Introduction finalists
Category: Non-Profit Organisation
Winner
Nour el Houda Bourbia
Finalists
Introduction finalists
Category: Empowered Women
Congratulation to Sinja Christiani (Zurich Insurance)
Sinja is an inspiration for women in tech – anyone who has ever worked with her is in awe of her ability to simplify complex technical (and people!) challenges and successfully coach teams to find solutions.
She is 100% impact, 0% ego – which explains the strong followership she has been able to build in her former roles as Deloitte Risk Analytics Consulting Lead and Agile Coach, as well as in her current role as Transformation Lead Zurich Data & BI.
Category: Startup / Innovation
Congratulations to Sanjana Rao (Miyara)
Dr. Sanjana Rao is extremely passionate about making women’s health accessible to all. She has a strong entrepreneurial spirit while at the same time being driven by the social cause. With a background (Ph.D. and Post Doc) in Biological Sciences, she brings to the table her scientific and research expertise in developing the business which has the main goal of making health information and solutions accessible to women.
Category: Non-Profit Organisation
Congratulations to Nour el Houda Bourbia (PwC Switzerland)
Houda is a dedicated and motivating person who has encouraged people to achieve goals and given them new opportunities. She and her sister put this quality into practice in their NGO “Backpack2School”. They support teachers in their training so that they can teach students from all backgrounds in the best possible way. In a world where a traditional classroom is becoming more and more diverse, they have seen the importance of this aspect.
These are the Hidden Figures Award winners 2021
From left to right: Taisha Fabricius (Keynote Non-Profit Category), Tatjana Nebel, Noemi Kaufmann, Alexandra Diening, Marisa Tschopp, Zulma Prieto, Claudia Bruce-Quartey (Jury Member), Magaly Mathys, Priska Burkard (Initiator and Co-Founder TechFace)
Category: Empowered Women
Winner
Alexandra Diening
Finalists
Introduction finalists
Category: Startup / Innovation
Winner
Zulma Prieto
Finalists
Introduction finalists
Category: Non-Profit Organisation
Winner
Sonia Karkare
Finalists
Introduction finalists
Category: Empowered Women
Congratulation to Alexandra Diening (EPAM Systems)
Alexandra is the head of Research for a large corporation in the tech industry. She built a team from 0 to 10+ experts, is part of senior leadership and driving the global research competency. Empowering others and driving the excellence in research in tech is at the heart of her work. All that meanwhile having her first child (now 2 years old), she embodies a true example of resilience and women power.
Category: Startup / Innovation
Congratulations to Zulma Prieto (Emilian AG)
Zulma has co-founded Emilian AG, an insurtech startup offering an insurance platform helping small insurance advisors, particularly in emerging countries, to digitize and contribute to closing the insurance gap in those countries. Thanks to Zulma’s vision, Emilian has developed a platform with the power of getting more people in the world protected. Emilian, being white label platform, allows insurance advisors to strengthen their business and their own brand and thereby contribute to their community with their business. Emilian is innovative because there currently exists no insurance platform which seeks to establish end-to-end-connectivity by connecting the data silos that currently exist in the sector.
Category: Non-Profit Organisation
Congratulations to Sonia Karkare (Adavanced to Ampify)
Sonia has co-founded Advanced to Amplify, to serve professionally at-risk women in reskilling and preparing for the digital economies of tomorrow. Advance to Amplify (AtoA), is a venture born out of the Roxbourg MBA program – a special, one-of-a-kind MBA program focused on social impact. The goal of our venture is to make a difference in gender diversity, especially for women who are professionally at-risk.
These are the Hidden Figures Award winners 2020
Category: Empowered Women
Congratulation to Emmanuelle David (EPFL Space Center)
Emmanuelle is a role model for so many women. After being a rocket scientist for several companies, Emmanuelle applied with a new born for an executive role at EPFL and became the executive lead of the space center of EPFL. She is questioning the status quo and supports young women as a mentor. Because of passion for sustainable development she aims that the space field gets more sustainable. I think Emmanuelle can change the world. She is a scientist, leader, mom and amazing friend. She is also very humble and I think more people need to get inspired by her, so that she can leverage her positive impact on society!
Category: Startup / Innovation
Congratulations to Siew-Veena Sahi (Testmate Health)
Siew-Veena Sahi is an incredibly devoted and inspirational co-founder. Whilst studying to become a medical doctor in the United Kingdom, Siew-Veena did an additional year of study completing a degree in Public Health. During these studies she came across the fact that there was no instant test available on the market for STIs. This had far reaching implications, one of which was linked to woman’s health and empowerment – an example being sexual health clinics in developing countries overprescribing antibiotics due to women not being able to visit clinics to receive results of testing. Having identified this as a woman’s health and empowerment issue and mulling it over for two years working as a Doctor in the NHS, she decided finally to take the plunge.
Category: Non-Profit Organisation
Congratulations to Corina Schedler (Code Excursion)
Corina is an inspiration, her energy and her soul are empowering. As a self-taught web developer, she is a true inspiration to any woman who wants to change her career to tech. Also as a co-founder of Code Excursion for 3 years, she is making it possible for numerous women to get started in tech. Her friendly, open go-getter personality and the Code-Excursion-Vibe with the flexible courses especially for women that they created are truly unique if we think about learning experiences in Switzerland.
Nominate a woman, who has shown her empowerment on the job, in a team or company. She has showcased how valuable her input was and has either increased revenues, made new business or created opportunities.
Alexandra Haas
Head of IoT of Swisscom
She is a tech, data-driven and passionate leader who drives digitalization in Switzerland and across borders. She is a genuinely authentic and humble leader, a convincing and inspiring tech speaker, who empowers her team, she truly lives for diversity and supports females in tech through a variety of communities. At the age of 33, she has been showing grit and persistence as a female tech leader. Her gems are data analytics and leadership. Alexandra is a role model as a female leader in tech.
Alexandra should receive the award to create more awareness that there are female badass tech leaders out there who can change the market and leadership style, empower other women to have a loud voice, and stand up to represent their true value. As a minority your focus is often not on how much impact you already have and how much you are doing for the female community, therefore it would mean the world for Alexandra to be reminded that it’s worth the effort.
Lisa Stähli
Co-Managing Director at Girls in Tech Switzerland and is responsible for press-related tasks.
Lisa was one of the first who took over the Girls in Tech Switzerland Management from the founder team. She did not hesitate to take on this opportunity, as this is exactly where she belongs. Lisa is very enthusiastic and always looking for opportunities to bring more women into tech. At the same time, her calm and reflective personality helps everyone to feel welcomed and contribute in their own way.
Lisa has been a driving force for GiT Switzerland! She is leading the team with passion, never losing sight of its mission and vision. With her energy and enthusiasm, she inspires their members to pursue a career in tech. Never does she miss an opportunity to share her knowledge, skills and expertise as an amazing teacher and instructor. The most impressive is her persistence to not only bring more women into tech but to ensure that we can find alleys to build a more inclusive environment in tech.
Sinja Christiani
DBI Transformation Director in Zurich Insurance.
Sinja is an inspiration for women in tech – anyone who has ever worked with her is in awe of her ability to simplify complex technical (and people!) challenges and successfully coach teams to find solutions.
She is 100% impact, 0% ego – which explains the strong followership she has been able to build in her former roles as Deloitte Risk Analytics Consulting Lead and Agile Coach, as well as in her current role as Transformation Lead Zurich Data & BI.
Sinja combines tech expertise with deep insight and empathy for how organizations and people tick. Combining these two, she is enabling global, complex organizations to get real value from data and tech. And she is blazing a trail for women in those organizations by acting as a role model for integrity.
Julia Vogel
Julia is an amazing peer in the technology / VC space. She has a PhD in computer science and has worked in various senior roles bridging business/technology – very hands-on and result oriented. She is a true inspiration to junior (female) tech people.
Julia is an inspiration as a tech leader who is always there to help and will push the best solution successfully in “political” organizations. She can be a great role model for any female STEM professional.
Julia could have been the female entrepreneur role model people are looking for when starting out their careers. Back then, you mostly saw male company founders, investors and entrepreneurs. This is still true today but changing slowly but surely.
Prisca Quadroni
Prisca is a mother of two young children and an accomplished lawyer in Switzerland. Her work is crucial and needs to create a better, and safe technocratic society in Switzerland.
Apart from her work, Prisca is a very open-minded person, with a huge thrive and willingness to help. If there is an open task, she is the first to raise her hand. If there is a problem, she is the first to address it. She is direct, you always now where you are at, no sweet talking, no backstabbing. She went above and beyond for her commitment to Women in AI.
Prisca is motivated, extremely professional, and smart. She is a great public speaker and a role model for future generations to come.
Prisca has founded a start-up as a legal & tech consultant; this means they consult companies on how to adhere to the legal standards required in the home country or in the EU or countries who want to collaborate with the EU. Why is this crucially important? A large number of companies harm other people or users, for instance, gender discrimination in health care, recruiting, or loans. Hundreds of ethical voluntary guidelines have flooded the market since then. Adherence is completely voluntary with no liability and accountability for those doing harm. With the upcoming EU AI Act, the first regulatory framework for regulating artificial intelligence, there is probably nothing more important now, than first, to understand these laws, second to make them transparent to all tech companies, and last, to protect those who get hurt. Prisca has chosen to work in a field of utmost importance, which is too often neglected by companies due to a lack of knowledge and willingness. Her work is crucial and needs to create a better, and safe technocratic society in Switzerland.
There are three main reasons why I believe Prisca would deserve this award.
1. As an appreciation for her work, and all the things she has done beyond expectations. Extremely professional, yet very humane.
2. On the other hand, her startup and what she is doing is crucially important work for our society.
3. She needs to have visibility and give the world, especially women the opportunity to see her shine – she is an inspirational role model.
Sanjana Rao
Dr. Sanjana Rao is extremely passionate about making women’s health accessible to all. She has a strong entrepreneurial spirit while at the same time being driven by the social cause. With a background (Ph.D. and Post Doc) in Biological Sciences, she brings to the table her scientific and research expertise in developing the business which has the main goal of making health information and solutions accessible to women. Her enthusiasm to work in this area shows in her willingness and openness to learn things along the way, like social media, product development, marketing and sales. She has great networking skills which is important as a founder. She makes sure to stay updated with the latest information in this area to be able to stay a step ahead in the field. Finally, she is extremely caring, sensitive, and empathetic to fellow co-workers as well as clients’ needs which is paying off in developing Miyara as a company and business.
Miyara is a start-up that is a preventive health and wellness platform for women. The first focus of Miyara is women in midlife. Similar to hormonal changes affecting women with fertility, pregnancy and postpartum, during midlife (prior and post-menopause), the drastic drop in some hormones causes major changes. Till the body can adapt to these changes, there are 34+ symptoms that can affect them at varying degrees. Additionally, how health and lifestyle are maintained through this stage can bear a lasting effect on aging health. Unfortunately, though they may experience some symptoms, they are not completely informed about how to manage them and lead healthy, productive lives through them.
Miyara provides a one-stop solution to these women from being a guide for these women to be able to understand their bodies (including mental health) and their symptoms to provide solutions in the form of services and products. Apart from working directly with women, Miyara works with corporates to provide awareness, sensitization and preventive health and lifestyle change solutions to help women thrive in their careers and help companies retain these women.
Dr. Sanjana Rao has been determined, motivated and exemplary in working towards building Miyara. The team had to pivot multiple times to reach where they are today in their focus and now they are delivering immense value to the customers due to her hard work. Working in a bootstrapped startup and being a founder has put immense pressure and sacrifice to build this social enterprise. Sanjana’s motivation has been the driver of this.
This award will help her get the due recognition with which she can be extra motivated to continue with the work despite the ups and downs of being a startup founder. This will also help motivate more women to take this step towards building social enterprises and knowing they can succeed. It will additionally help Miyara get recognition in turn helping Dr. Sanjana in her work.
Karina Mereuta
Karina is one of the co-founders of an ed-tech startup that specializes in creating learning programs in the sustainability area. The first program, Women back To Work – Skill Set Sustainability Careers, was an opportunity to tackle a societal problem in Switzerland as mothers or women expats have difficulties finding a job here. Covering the S of the ESG as a professional and believe that SMEs and entrepreneurial organizations need a 360 degrees approach to understand and implement sustainability, Karina co-founded Fructify Network, a platform on a mission to support companies and professionals to pivot to business as a force of good.
It is a women-led non-profit on a mission to empower people on their sustainability journey with chewable information, to scale the impact. Their Knowledge Hub will bring bite-size information about sustainability, FROM people FOR people. Everyone will finally understand what sustainability is and how they can make a difference. They are developing a sustainability education tech platform that is aligned with the Hidden Figures Awards values and eligibility.
Karina is an outstanding professional in sustainability and a career changer, continuously evolving and learning with the team. She shows flexibility and an out-of-the-box approach in terms of creativity and team building and she is a great colleague to work with. In a very short amount of time, Karina has successfully developed relationships with partners, stakeholders, suppliers and other important actors in the sustainability ecosystem. A lot of successes in this organization are because of Karina’s continued commitment to inspiring and motivating all of us through good or difficult personal times. Her community and Fructify Network contributions make her a one-of-a-kind candidate for the award.
Nour el Houda Bourbia
“Houda is a dedicated and motivating person who has encouraged me to achieve goals that I did not think I could achieve. She built me up when I didn’t believe in myself. She has given me new opportunities and introduced me to people who can help me with my goals. She believed in me when even though I did not believe in myself. She encouraged and challenged me at a time when I was trying to find myself and always kept me aware of what I could achieve in life. I could always rely on Houda. She always made time for me and listened to me and made sure I kept progressing. She voluntarily took me under her wing as her coachee and has been a strong role model for me over the last few years.
She and her sister also put this quality into practice in their NGO “Backpack2School”. They support teachers in their training so that they can teach students from all backgrounds in the best possible way. In a world where a traditional classroom is becoming more and more diverse, they have seen the importance of this aspect. As a child of migrants, I know how important it is that teachers know and understand the needs of all students. For me, Houda is not only a role model as a woman in STEM, but also as a human being in life.”
Nesrin and Houda Bourbia were born in Algeria and migrated to Switzerland at the age of eight. They experienced integration into a new society firsthand and understand the importance of inclusive classrooms. In 2018 they founded backpack2school to realize a program that aims to prepare the teachers of tomorrow for the increasingly multicultural classroom. The founders want every single child to have the opportunity to thrive in the
classroom, irrespective of their background.”
In my eyes, Houda is not aware of how much she does for society as a whole. She puts a lot of heart and soul into Backpack2School which shows a lot of grace. In addition, Houda always wants others to shine and feel great about their own achievements. It is about time that she shines and that she feels good about everything she achieved so far. An award would finally give her the recognition she deserves.
Susanne König
Susanne has more than 13 years in web design & development, online and email marketing, and other digital things. Her curiosity and strive to make a difference led her to join Powercoders 3 years ago. She solidified the IT curriculum and has continuously further developed the learning offers & experience to make sure the candidates are best prepared for an IT career. She’s been doing this job with all her heart (and continued to freelance on the side). Currently, she’s taking a very well-deserved sabbatical.
Powercoders is a work integration program for refugees and migrants. The main program is a 3-month training followed by a 6-12 month internship. The ultimate goal of the Powercoders program is the permanent placement of trained refugees and migrants in IT companies and IT departments in Switzerland.
Susanne has dedicated all her heart to supporting the Powercoders candidates in being ready for an IT career. She has continuously improved the curriculum and learning design over time. This includes the focus tracks she introduced, collaborations with various organizations (such as the Swiss Testing Board), and the Connecting Program (for the candidates who don’t find a follow-up solution immediately). She is very talented, has very broad technical skills, and is a wonderful learning facilitator.
Susanne is not aware of this nomination. This would be a very nice recognition of her work vis-à-vis the countless hours and efforts she has put into this role.
Nominate a woman, who started her own business in any of the STEM related industries, helped to increase diversity in STEM or has been a crucial part of an innovative solution.
Nominate a woman, who has made a tremendous contribution for a non-profit organisation within or supporting the STEM area or has had a great impact as a volunteer.