Basel Investor Forum: Art Basel edition 2026
Agenda Overview – Themes & Strategic Focus
This forum is designed as a curated platform for Family Offices, HNWI investors, and innovation leaders who are shaping the next era of capital allocation. The agenda reflects a clear shift in global markets: technology, geopolitics, demographic pressure, and climate instability are converging, requiring investors to think beyond traditional asset classes and focus on systemic investing.
Each topic has been selected to help participants explore where value will be created over the next decade, and how long-term capital can position itself at the intersection of innovation, resilience, and real-world impact.
Thursday, 18 June 2026
09:00 – 09:45 | Doors Open & Welcome Breakfast
Participants arrive with informal introductions, coffee, and networking across Family Offices, strategic investors, and ecosystem leaders.
09:45 – 10:00 | Welcome & Opening
Alain Bindels (Founder Basel Investor Forum) - A curated welcome moment to set the tone for the Forum.
10:00 – 10:30 | Opening Keynote
Culture & New Humanism: Shaping a Space Where Capital Meets Consciousness
A powerful opening keynote grounded in human-centered systems thinking. Silvia Zimmermann del Castillo will explore how global volatility, societal fragmentation, and accelerating technological change demand a new investment philosophy—one rooted not only in return, but in responsibility, long-term resilience, and the future of humanity.
This keynote sets a calm, reflective, and intellectually ambitious tone—creating the conditions for meaningful dialogue, deeper alignment, and purposeful capital stewardship.
Speaker: Silvia Zimmermann del Castillo (Co-President, Club of Rome)
10:30 – 11:15 | Systemic Investing Panel
Capital Stewardship in an Age of Systemic Risk & Opportunity
Investment at the intersection of economic returns, measurable impact, and systems change
This flagship panel explores how leading investors and philanthropic capital stewards are moving beyond ESG and traditional impact frameworks toward systemic investing—an approach that treats healthcare, technology, nature, and governance as interconnected systems shaping long-term value creation.
The discussion will examine how Family Offices can structure portfolios to capture returns while strengthening resilience across critical systems—and how to measure outcomes with integrity rather than narratives.
Speakers:
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Moderator -Janna Schubert (Director of Growth, Center for Sustainable Finance and Private Wealth)
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Adela Villanueva - Co-Founder & Managing Partner TIO (The Impact Office)
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Johannes Tschiderer - Senior Associate at the TransCap Initiative (TCI)
11:15 – 11:45 | Coffee Break
A curated networking moment designed for targeted introductions and informal deal conversations.
11:45 – 12:45 | Roundtables (5 Verticals)
Systemic Investment Frontiers – Interactive Deep Dives
Participants break into five parallel roundtables designed as strategic “mini labs.”
Each roundtable explores investable opportunity zones, key risks, and emerging co-investment models within its vertical.
Objective: move from theory → real allocation logic.
Vertical Themes:
12:45 – 14:15 | Networking Lunch & Art Sensory journey
This is where capital meets real opportunities, where follow-up meetings are booked, and where co-investment discussions begin.
Walk through & engagement with the artists, art pieces, VR and Tea experience corner.
14:15-15:00 | Why measure? Impact measurement beyond Carbon Credits Panel
While the limitations of current impact measurement frameworks are something of an open secret, the urgency to evolve them has never been greater—particularly in today’s volatile and interconnected world. This session brings together leading voices at the forefront of impact and nature finance to explore how we move beyond narrow metrics such as carbon credits toward more holistic, decision-useful approaches. We will hear from pioneers developing next-generation frameworks and share practical lessons on how impact measurement can more effectively guide capital allocation—toward solutions that deliver meaningful, measurable outcomes. At its core, the discussion will focus on a fundamental question: what is the true legacy of your capital, and how can we better understand and measure it?
Speakers:
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Rucha Naware - Senior Communications Leader, Former UN & WWF (Moderator)
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Marco Lambertini - Executive Chair Nature Positive Initiative
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James Gifford - Senior Fellow, CSP / World Economic Forum
15:00 – 16:00 | ROUNDTABLES repeated (5 Verticals)
Systemic Investment Frontiers – Interactive Deep Dives
Participants rotate into a second roundtable session to gain exposure to a new investment frontier.
Vertical Themes (descriptions see morning sessions above)
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Future of Healthcare
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Human Behavior & Adoption: The Missing Layer in Systems Innovation
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De-Risking Investment Through Trust, Local Leadership and Data.
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Financing the Future of Food: Turning Science and Innovation into Investable Opportunities.
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You Are Part of the System You Want to Change. This session is for wealth holders only.
16:00 – 16:15 | Refreshments
Informal networking.
16:15 – 17:15 | Art & Culture Spotlight Session
The Art of Noticing - Catalyzing for impact
A curated Art Basel-style experience combining cultural immersion with strategic conversation.
Guests walk through selected art pieces followed by a short artist intervention on the role of art, creativity, and cultural narratives in enabling systemic innovation.
This session will include two Artists spotlight presentations which will be followed by a Panel discussion with the participating artists on their perspective on the role of Art & Culture in fostering positive impact.
Interactive session with the audience - reflections on their sensory journey.
17:15 – 17:30 | Fireside Chat & Closing Reflections
From Insights to Action: What Systemic Investing Requires Now
A closing fireside designed to connect the day’s key insights into one coherent narrative. Stefan and Alain reflect on what systemic investing looks like in practice—from governance and mandate design to catalytic capital structures and co-investment readiness.
A forward-looking closing that anchors momentum.
Speakers: Stefan German (CEO Ursimone Wietlisbach Foundation) & Alain Bindels (Founder Basel Investor Forum)
17:30 – 19:30 | Apero
The evening concludes with an elegant apéro designed for deeper relationship-building and informal investment dialogue.
What Attendees Can Expect Overall
Participants can expect:
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High-signal conversations rather than generic panels
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Strategic insight into emerging investment frontiers
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Cross-sector perspective: tech, healthcare, climate, capital markets, and culture
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Trusted networking with aligned Family Offices and investors
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Actionable takeaways: how to position portfolios for the next decade
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Exposure to new models: co-investment, venture building, catalytic capital, and partnership investing
2. Human Behavior & Adoption: The Missing Layer in Systems Innovation (Anastasia Kalinina, Co-founder/CEO at reState Foundation, Senior Advisor on Partnerships United Nations Economic Commission for Europe; Nisaa Jetha, Founder of Impact for SDGs, Founder of the Creative Economy Institute, Managing Director for a private family office) Technological breakthroughs alone do not transform societies. It is human adoption that does. Across AI, healthcare, climate, finance, and consumer industries, the greatest bottleneck is no longer invention, but trust, behavior change, cultural relevance, and collective coordination. The future belongs to organizations and investors who understand how humans adopt new systems, identities, and ways of living. The next wave of value creation will come from aligning technology with human systems. Not the other way around.
4. Financing the Future of Food: Turning Science and Innovation into Investable Opportunities. (Romano De Vivo, Vice Chair of the Global Forum on Agricultural Research and Innovation (GFAiR) & Chair RAMP Advisory Committee) We can already grow more food with less land, build healthier soils, and make food systems more resilient — but that innovation often struggles to reach the farm. Between an early idea and its real use — on the farm, by processors, and finally on the consumer's plate — there's a gap that ordinary investment tends to leave open. Investors can help close it, turning good research into results you can actually measure: for farmers, for businesses, for consumers, and for investors themselves.
3. De-Risking Investment Through Trust, Local Leadership and Data. (Cintia Jaime, Co-Founder of ES VICIS Foundation; Daniel Winzenried, CEO World Vision Switzerland & Liechtenstein; Co-Founder of ES VICIS Foundation) Investors focus on capital performance and are naturally risk-averse. Communities focus on immediate needs. Local leaders are often dispersed, stakeholders rarely work together, and critical decisions are frequently made without reliable data.Between these realities lies a missing but critical enabling environment — a trusted space where relationships can develop, trust can grow, and diverse actors can align around shared goals.
1. Future of Healthcare - Longevity, biomarkers, neurodegeneration, precision medicine, and the future of prevention. (Dr. Bilal Fares, Co-founder, CEO, AzureCell SA; Senior Scientific Collaborator, University of Geneva) With the rapid emergence of regenerative cell- and gene-based therapies opening the door to not only treating but potentially reversing neurodegenerative diseases, this timely roundtable will explore why this space represents a compelling frontier for next-generation investment. Still in its early stages, with limited large pharma, regulatory, and investor penetration, these innovations offer significant potential for scale, impact and also replication across other overlooked areas of healthcare R&D.
5. You Are Part of the System You Want to Change. This session is for wealth holders only. (Britta Gruenig, Stewardship Advisor, Gruenig & Partners, Senior Fellow Center for Sustainable Finance and Private Wealth) Systemic investing doesn't fail because of bad strategy - it fails because wealth holders don't see themselves in their own analysis. In this session, Britta Gruenig - pioneer of the inner-work dimension in wealth-holder education for two decades - offers a live, embodied working session with her frameworks Five Ways to Steward and Nested System Sensing: two practical maps for understanding how your inner world shapes the systems you are part of and the capital you deploy. You will leave with a personal worksheet and one concrete insight into how your inner architecture may be the most underestimated leverage point in your portfolio. Suggested pre-read (optional): https://www.stewardfield.com/p/you-are-part-of-the-system-you-want
