All posts tagged funding

  • July 11, 2018

    Startup CEOs that think big!

    tropicalgringo-portfolio-2018It’s been more than a year since I’ve written an update on the TropicalGringo Portfolio, the five startups where I am an advisor and shareholder.  There is really big news from all of these companies from multimillion dollar rounds raised to Silicon Valley and other US investment activity.  Though there is a lot of work to be done to advance the Colombian startup ecosystem as a whole, these companies and their founders join  a growing list of Colombian startups that are incredible role models for the future startups in this country.

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  • January 12, 2016

    Platzi closes $2.1M seed round

    Platzi seed roundI’m happy to report (as did the Wall Street Journal) that Platzi has closed a $2.1M seed round.  It’s CEO and co-founder, Freddy Vega, is pictured above during my recent interview with him in Colombia.  Freddy is Colombian and his talented co-founder, Christian Van Der Henst, hails from Guatemala. Nonetheless, both are true blue global startup guys (citizens of the world).

    I’ve always felt that these guys are valuable role models particularly for entrepreneurs in the region because of their having been able to bootstrap their business through sheer talent, desire and hard work.  I see this as extremely valuable in terms of a model that a large portion of Latin American entrepreneurs (that don’t have access to initial capital or highly placed business connections) can emulate.

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  • June 25, 2010

    Latin American Startups – Yesterday’s News Items

    Netactica ArticleYesterday was an interesting day in “Startupland Latin America.” TechCrunch published an article about Groupon’s entry into this market by acquiring Chile’s ClanDescuento and Brazil’s ClubUrbano.  According to the article, the blogosphere is abuzz with the fact that ClanDescuento (humorously called SpamDescuento) built up its audience with a ton of spamming, which is a shame since companies such as Compra3 which I wrote about a while back, have been innovating in the space. The article also mentions a blogger called Mariano Amartino who has some interesting posts (note to myself: I need to explore more Latin American blogs).

    Also, yesterday, VentureBeat published my article on a really interesting online travel company called Netactica.  This is what happens when you get two Argentineans together with an Aussie. :) You get some innovative and robust end-to-end technology to help Online Travel Agents (OTA) and others (such as the impressive guys at Mantaraya Travel) be successful in Latin America.

    Mark my words. Digital Innovation is about to explode in Latin America.  There’s still a lot of evangelization to get accomplished in this region, but the list of future success stories will continue to grow from examples such as Buscapé and MercadoLibre to more and more companies getting outside funding.

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