All posts tagged digital innovation

  • November 9, 2011

    Smart Money Diving into Colombian Internet Companies

    brandsbag launchWhen my friend, Jorge Pulido, from PriceWaterHouse invited me to a launch party, I never expected it to be such an impressive launch of an Internet company for the Colombian market. The company is called BrandsBag and it’s entering full speed ahead into the Colombian market with a flash sales site targeting women who love fashion.

    What’s most interesting about this new endeavor is that it is a mix of impressive entrepreneurs from Brazil, Argentina and Colombia that have decided to start their Latin American strategy from Colombia.  As I mentioned previously in a NYTimes article, the Brazilian Internet market is on fire and more and more US VC’s are investing in that country.  Nevertheless, witnessing the impressive launch tonight of BrandsBag confirms our confidence in Colombia as a country from which to launch Latin American-wide Internet initiatives and funding these initiatives through our new Micro VC fund,  Tayrona Ventures.

    alan delioI had the chance to meet the leaders of BrandsBag such as Diego Rodriguez and Delio Epaminondas (with me in the photo on the left).  These are sharp business people who are extremely serious about transforming the shopping experience in the region and see Colombia as an excellent lauchpad to achieve this objective throughout Latin America.  The country boasts a growing middle class, internet penetration and ecommerce increasing at above 40% and a market with overpriced fashion items (sometimes more than 100% markup above prices in other countries).

    As Marc Andreessen mentioned in a previous WSJ article, software is indeed eating up industry after industry as digital innovation takes hold. In countries such as Colombia, the potential is even greater since competition in markets such as retail is much less ferocious allowing incumbents to charge an arm and a leg.  These types of companies are ripe for disruption and make Colombia an ideal market to provide new (digital) offerings that can be incredibly profitable and still undercut the established players.  BrandsBag is betting big on Colombia and in the process has a chance to showcase the potential of this country as a profitable gateway/launchpad to the rest of Latin America.

    1 Comment / Case Studies, English /

  • September 27, 2011

    Social Media Week Bogota Presentation

    Alan Colmenares - Social Media Week BogotaThe other day, I had the distinct pleasure of addressing a capacity crowd at Social Media Week Bogota.  I had been working hard on, among other things, launching an seed fund called Tayrona Ventures as well as helping launch a new flash sales startup called SuperTrendi and didn’t expect to have such a good time presenting on Friday.

    I really enjoyed the audience and found them incredibly receptive to my message about how social media (among other digital tools) is changing the way companies do business and the general business environment. This environment is great for startups and for accelerators such as the Founder Institute of which I am Director in Colombia. I call this whole phenomenon Digital Innovation and explained it at length during my presentation.

    Today, I was gratified to read Diana Luque’s impressions of my speech and the message I was trying to get out there.  I also put my presentation slides on Slideshare and was amazed to see how popular the slide deck became.  It was great to see this because, as I wrote in a post on the day of the presentation, I had been working hard on that deck the night before and for the first time used my new corporate image and brand of TG Coach although the website is still under construction.  Among the points I made during the presentation, was the fact that the advertising agency industry is coming under attack as mentioned in an article yesterday in Adweek.  Finally, I was quite flabbergasted to get two separate emails from Slideshare informing me that my presentation was one of their hottest pieces of content on Twitter and Linkedin and am showing a shot of the homepage at that moment here. :)

    Social Media Week Bogota - Slideshare

    1 Comment / English, Internet Marketing /

  • September 23, 2011

    Presentación en Social Media Week Bogota

    Social Media Week BogotaTengo muchos amigos que han estado yendo a Social Media Week acá en Bogotá y me da una lastima que no he podido asistir.  Como escribí anteriormente, tuve excelente viaje a Medellin y otras coas que no me han permitido sacar tiempo para asistir. Sin embargo, hoy voy a presentar a las 4pm sobre la transformación de los negocios, en parte, gracias al auge de los medios sociales, y atraves de lo que yo llamo innovación digital.

    Mi impresión (de los tweets) es que Social Media Week al fin consigió una organización que ha podido sacarle provecho a esta iniciativa acá en Colombia: Zemoga.  Felicitaciones a ambas partes ya que conozco al creador de Social Media Week, Toby, y estoy seguro que debe estar muy feliz en este momento. :)

    Fuera de todo, hoy tambien voy a regalar un cupo para el taller de Innovación Digital que se dictará el 4 de octubre.  Todavia no he pensado como voy a decidir quien es el ganador o la ganadora, pero algo se me ocurirá.  Van a estar muchos amigos ahí en la audiencia (lo cual es bueno porque luego hay cervezas!) y por primera vez va venir mi esposa a escuchar una de mis presentaciones.  Ella es instructora de yoga y le ayude a crear su blog llamada YogaMiel y su pagina en Facebook hace un año entonces ha tenido contacto con los medios sociales gracias a su espposo nerdo.

    Hablando de la esposa. Ella acaba de llegar y vamos aprovechar para tomarnos un cafe.  Abajo dejo los slides que voy a presentar hoy en la tarde.  Estoy utilizando una nueva imagen para mi empresa llamada TG Coach.  Ya puedo escuchar los criticismos sobre el hecho que la pagina de TG Coach todavia está bajo contrucción pero yo soy de la filosofia de los startups (asi me considero) de lanzar temprano y mejorar continuamente.  Si entran a la pagina van a tener una idea leve de la direccion y me encantaría escuchar sugerencias sobre esto si pueden incluir esto en los comentarios abajo de este articulo (post).  Hagamos crowdsourcing de la pagina de TG Coach. :)

    Finalmente, acá están los slides que los acabo de subir a slideshare:

    Social media week bogota – Alan Colmenares

    No Comments / Español, Mercadeo Internet /

  • August 25, 2011

    Lots of speeches lately

    Speech at eCommerce DayIt looks like I’ve been doing a lot of talking lately about Digital Innovation and Internet startups and the startup ecosystem.  Last night, I had the opportunity to talk at an event called eCommerce Day Bogota along with impressive entrepreneur, Oscar Giraldo, founder of Arcaris.  It was great to hear the interest from everyone in entrepreneurship and  what we’ve been accomplishing with the Founder Institute in Colombia.

    Additionally, last week, I had the opportunity to address a group of bankers at an event sponsored by the Bankers’ Association.  I was able to give them a perspective on where the startup action is in terms of the financial services vertical and was happy with the feedback and the interest from the industry in these topics.  I was accompanied by my Founder Institute Colombia team member, Juan Manuel Lopez as well by a co-founder of one of the Founder Institute graduating companies that is firing on all cylinders, financial product comparator site: Comparamejor.

    CartagenaLast but not least, I had tremendous pleasure of staying in some swanky accommodations in Cartagena and took advantage of this by smoking 4 of my favorite cigars during that two day period.  I’m sure hardly anyone kicks back like that, but to each his own. :)

    eCommerce Day Bogota – Alan Colmenares

    No Comments / English, General /
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