Tag: latin american startups

Complete Guide to Venture Capital in Latin America

Category : Latin America Startups and Investing
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venture capital latin america

According to LAVCA’s latest State of the Industry Report, Latin American startups received a total of USD$500M in all of 2016. In just the first 6 months of 2017, they received USD$477M.

It is clear that Latin America is experiencing a substantial uptick in venture capital activity. For one, Series C rounds in Latin America totaled USD$314M for the first half of 2017, compared to USD$208M raised in all of 2016.

Additionally, the investments in 99, Brazil’s largest rideshare service, by Didi, China’s largest ridesharing company, represented two of the top three largest investment rounds of all time in Latin America.

The report also uncovered that 93% of the funding that Latin American startups received this year in VC funding went to the IT sector. This is almost triple the amount that was invested in the fiscal year 2016 through the same number of deals.

vc in latin americaImage Source: LAVCA

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Magma Partners: Supporting Latin American Entrepreneurs

Category : Latin America Startups and Investing
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In 2014, I was sitting in a Manhattan office tower, asking an experienced venture capitalist for advice about Magma Partners, our new seed stage fund that finds the best entrepreneurs in Latin America and helps them launch and scale their US incorporated startups in the states.

The VC’s advice? Leave Latin America. Come back to the US. “You’re going to lose all your money!” Nearly all of my entrepreneur and investor friends said the same thing.

Since 2014, my partners and I have invested $2M of our own money into a portfolio of 32 fast growing companies founded by entrepreneurs from 9 countries that employ 300+ people from 13 countries. All for less than a typical Silicon Valley company’s seed round.

The diverse founders we support are building real US incorporated businesses that generate eight figures in annual revenue. And they’re 90% more capital efficient than Silicon Valley startups. (more…)

Ep 24 Jonathan Nelson, How the Serving Leader Empowers Startups and Changes Communities

Category : Crossing Borders Podcast, Mexico
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There are many roads to Silicon Valley, but you’ll likely not hear one as unusual as the one my guest today took. Jonathan Nelson started out as the son of missionaries in Honduras and Costa Rica and learned the role of a serving leader by watching his Dad lead a mission organization. But he left Central America for nursing school, a computer science education, and finally headed to Silicon Valley.

Today, Jonathan runs Hackers and Founders, the largest network of entrepreneurs in the world. In this conversation we walk through the steps that led him from nursing school to startup founder, how he created an entrepreneurial meetup in a bar that led to an acceleration co-op, and the ways he’s iterating to bring more funding and more improvement to the cultures of Latin America through his company, Hackers and Founders.

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Ep 7: Nora Leary, Launchway Media

Category : Argentina, Colombia, Crossing Borders Podcast
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Welcome to Crossing Borders with Nathan Lustig, where I interview entrepreneurs doing startups across borders and the people who support them, with a focus on companies that have some relationship to Latin America.

If you’re new to the podcast, be sure to check out Episode 2 with Adrian Fisher, founder of PropertySimple, who went from selling hotdogs to raising $3m and Episode 5, with Devin Baptiste, cofounder of GroupRaise one of the most diverse startups in the world.

My guest today is Nora Leary cofounder and Head of Marketing and Business Development at Launchway Media, a marketing agency that works with global startups launching in the US.

Nora and I talk about her journey from the US to Africa to Latin America, to leaving a job in Latam to starting her own business. Nora lived in Buenos Aires and started her business there with two other female cofounders, and then moved to Medellin to continue to expand the business

We cover cultural difference between doing business in the US and Latin America, what it’s like being a woman in tech in Latin America, practical tips for getting PR in the US, getting into a US accelerator from Latin America, and tools and tricks you need to be successful launching in the US market. And also emojis.

I’ve been working with Nora and her team for a few months now and it was great to finally get to connect outside of a pure business context. I hope you enjoy our conversation.

I’ve had a great time talking with Nora and I hope you enjoy her story as much as I do. If you do, please subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher, leave a rating and tell your friends!

If you have questions, think there’s something I should improve or have recommendations for guests you’d like me to interview, please let me know in the comments!