NuMundo Ventures

Happy that my trip to Colombia 🇨🇴 took me to the Nubank office and Carlos Prada. The offices are across the street from the Universidad EAN where we hosted our Colombia Tech Week event earlier in the day. I got the full tour and we were able to go on the rooftop to take in the stunning views of Bogota. Nubank, along with Mercado Libre, are the icons of the tech startup world in Latin America. Each new market Nubank opens is a new entrepreneurial journey for the company and their team. Colombia is the third country in LatAm for NuBank and after years of setting a strong foundation, is now experiencing rapid growth. To hear the stories from Carlos and many of the early team members in Colombia, it sounds like a classic entrepreneurial journey. Now we are starting to see ex-Nubankers in Colombia starting new companies, including 2 companies on our first Colombia Early Stage 100 list: Guama (Alfredo J. Prieto, Maria Paula Pinzón, Katherine Velilla, Vic) and Palomma (YC W23) (Cipriano Echavarria). It's no surprise Nubankers will be playing a huge role within the ecosystem directly and through their talented team members, especially the Colombians! Samuel Dulik, Laura Marino, David Vélez, Cristina Junqueira

Amazing times Colombia Tech Week with my team members Maria José Echeverri and Alejandro Lopez Correa. Over 170 people came to the Universidad EAN to learn about what it takes to build a world class startup in Colombia and celebrate the inaugural Early Stage 100 list. Majo and Alejo worked tirelessly to launch the first Colombia Tech Week and were extremely generous to support my efforts to shine a light on early stage founders in the country. We worked together as a team and the results were above our expectations. * LinkedIn turned purple yesterday as companies posted about their participation on the list *we published a website with a market map and the full list * we hosted an event with three world class founders: Angela Acosta, Christian Knudsen Daccach, and Nicolas Rojas Nino. Behind the scenes there was tremendous support from the events and audiovisual team at EAN (Cesar Alejandro Ortega Jurado, Deisy Jhoanna Mora Gómez, Mónica del Pilar Ramos Acosta), Bruno Migliorini, Franco Corbalán, and the team at Inbound Tools at SquadS Ventures, Carlos Rousseau, Mack Meyer, Hilary Holmquest ( ❤️ ), and many others. And of course, many thanks to all the founders that applied and worked with us to make this list come to life. Teamwork makes the dreamwork!

Congrats to Mairon Sandoval, Manuel Cangas, and the entire OneCarNow! team on the announcement of their $86M debt and equity Series A fundraise! At last week's board meeting I was struck by the discipline, ambition, and growth mindset of the entire executive team. Big thanks to the major investors in OneCarNow! including Caravela Capital, Collide Capital, Great North Ventures, and New Stack Ventures, and their debt partner i80 Group. I recently had a chance to chat with Mairon about the journey so far. It is a rare glimpse into the story of a startup journey from pre-launch to accelerating scale. I always learn from Mairon and I think you will see why I am such a strong advocate for OneCarNow! It is only the beginning! Brian Hollins, Lucas Dzierwa de Lima, Brunna Zogbi, Ryan Weber, Sumit Malhotra, Edward Goldstein, Bruno Migliorini, José Francisco García Marrón, Omelette Media, amoGrowth, Nate Pierotti

All roads in LatAm neobanking lead to Samuel Dulik from Nubank! I was first introduced to Sam by Anna Piñol about 1.5 years ago. Sam and I had a nice Zoom call where I learned about his path to LatAm and fintech. Since that meeting more people talked to me about Sam in glowing terms including Arnoldo J. Gabaldón from Cashea, Carlos Prada from Nubank, Christopher Stromeyer from Ualá, and many more. Sam and I finally met in person in his home town of Palo Alto. His journey to now being head of new markets at NuBank has been anything but linear. Sam went to Georgetown University with an initial idea of becoming a diplomat and entering the foreign service. He had no connection to Latin America whatsoever, but that soon changed. While at school he took a class taught by the former and future president of Colombia (Álvaro Uribe, Iván Duque Márquez) and soon after took a study abroad at Universidad de Los Andes. After graduating he worked in consulting in Washington DC but the pull to Latin America was strong and he found a way to work in Mexico and Bogota before returning to business school at Stanford University Graduate School of Business After business school, he returned to Bogota to work at Bain & Company and eventually being hired by Carlos Prada to help expand Nubank in Colombia. Sam was in town for his MBA reunion as well as the NuBank board meeting. It was fascinating to hear about his role in evaluating new markets at the company that has such a strong foundation to expand in a number of areas and geographies. It was an honor to meet someone held in such high regard by everyone who knows him. I can say from first hand, I agree with them! Anna Piñol, Camila Key Saruhashi, Laura Marino, David Vélez, Jerónimo Uribe , Tomas Uribe

On the day Nubank announces reaching 100 million customers, I want to share the story of Laura Marino who leads the product team for the core global banking product at NuBank. Laura is Colombian 🇨🇴 and a proud graduate of Universidad de Los Andes who in the mid 80s came to Silicon Valley to earn a graduate degree from Stanford University. Like me and other Colombians like Andres Botero, once she arrived in the valley she decided she had to stay. From there she started a long and distinguished career in product management and marketing at some of the most innovative companies at the time including Nuance Communications and Tellme Networks. A few years ago, Laura was in Colombia and met with the NuBank team when they were in the early phase of launching services in the country. Then over the course of time and many twists and turns, the stars aligned and she joined NuBank earlier this year to lead one of the most strategic products in their portfolio, the bank account. Laura literally is a bridge between the knowledge and experience of the valley and Latin America. Product management is one of the areas where executives in the Silicon Valley can share best practices and insights that can drive Latin American companies further. Like Larissa Fontaine at QuintoAndar, Laura is one of several product leaders based in Silicon Valley making a big impact at the leading tech companies in LatAm. It's an honor to get to know Laura and can't wait for what she, her team, and NuBank has in store in the coming years. Samuel Dulik, Carlos Prada, David Vélez, Daniel Uribe Villa, Constanza Nieto, ◽️Andres Bilbao, Daniel Bilbao, Harlyn Pacheco, César Wedemann, Arturo Nunez

QuintoAndar + Buildpeer + NuMundo Ventures + Stanford University Last night I was lucky to join Larissa Fontaine and Mauricio Valdes on a panel about property tech and construction tech in Latin America at Nelson Koen's class at Stanford. Larissa is a Silicon Valley veteran having worked at Google for many years and now leads product at QuintoAndar, arguably the most successful proptech in LatAm. Her personal story is very compelling on how she grew up in Illinois, was an elite gymnast, coached for many years, and eventually made her way into the world of technology where she continues to excel. She highlighted the friction involved in renting, buying, and living in homes in Latin America and how technology can play a crucial role in solving these problems. I was very impressed with the scope and ambition of QuintoAndar and the close ties to Stanford given the founders Gabriel Braga and Andre Penha are Stanford University Graduate School of Business grads. Mauricio Valdes is the CEO of Buildpeer, a construction tech company based in Monterrey, MX that helps General Contractors and other builders improve how they collaborate and manage construction projects. I am a proud investor in Buildpeer and it was very impressive to see Mauricio in a different context share his founder story and the opportunity to digitize construction in Latin America. Most importantly, I am extremely grateful to Nelson Koen for giving me the opportunity to attend his class this quarter and present in the final session. It was the first time I have been in a classroom at Stanford in 25 years and it was the highlight of every week for the past few months. I learned a ton, was inspired by the students, and built several new friendships. Stanford is an incredible community that continues to make a big impact on entrepreneurship in LatAm!

New fundraising cheatsheet for early-stage founders in 2024. Covers median valuation, cash raised, and dilution (or expected dilution) for each stage of the early fundraising journey - including the data on SAFE raises which have come to dominate this part of the VC market. Wanted to include only the freshest possible data, so limited it to the most recent 75 rounds in each stage. Generally covers a period from Dec 1 2023 thru today. Post-money SAFEs for the first three sections, primary priced rounds for the bottom two. All data for US tech startups only 🙏 To the data! 𝗔𝗻𝗴𝗲𝗹 𝗥𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱 (𝗨𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿 $𝟱𝟬𝟬𝗞 𝗿𝗮𝗶𝘀𝗲𝗱) • $6M val cap • $150K raised • 2.3% dilution (upon the completion of a priced round) 𝗣𝗿𝗲-𝗦𝗲𝗲𝗱 ($𝟱𝟬𝟬𝗞-$𝟭𝗠 𝗿𝗮𝗶𝘀𝗲𝗱) • $10M val cap • $695K raised • 8.1% implied dilution 𝗦𝗲𝗲𝗱 𝗼𝗻 𝗦𝗔𝗙𝗘𝘀 ($𝟭𝗠-$𝟮.𝟱𝗠 𝗿𝗮𝗶𝘀𝗲𝗱) • $12M val cap • $1.52M raised • 15.2% implied dilution 𝗣𝗿𝗶𝗰𝗲𝗱 𝗦𝗲𝗲𝗱 𝗥𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱 • $12.4M pre-money valuation • $3.5M raised • 20.8% dilution 𝗦𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗔 • $47.3M pre-money valuation • $10.3M raised • 19.9% dilution Of course these are medians, so many rounds happening above and below these figures. Dynamics for each raise are unique, dictated by sector, founder profile, fund economics, etc etc. But hopefully these give founders (and investors) a sense of the current baselines. Plug in to more data on startups and the venture capital that funds them in our Data Minute newsletter - https://lnkd.in/gNa_Dk-F #cartadata #startups #fundraising #founders #earlystage  

Tecnológico de Monterrey is one of the most important parts of the technology ecosystem in Mexico and Latin America. A university with branches across Mexico, it's alumni play a very important role in entrepreneurship across the region. I learned about the importance of "Tec" from Ignacio Alvarez, a fintech founder (moneypool) who teaches a class at the Monterrey campus. I invested in two companies founded by his former students (PideDirecto LATAM - Hussein A. Fawzi, Ronni Samir, Orchata - Luis Mario Garcia). The more I spoke with Nacho the more I learned about Tec the more I wanted to build relationships with the university. A few years later I was thrilled to host 25 people at my home in Portola Valley that are part of the "Tec Beyond- Silicon Valley" program. The goals of Tec Beyond are to inspire and challenge successful business people in Mexico to get more involved with the technology ecosystem in Mexico and to bring more technological innovation to their own companies and communities. The group had drinks and dinner at my home and spent almost 2 hours asking me any question ("AMA") they had about investing in early stage startups in LatAm and the US. I shared my journey, mistakes I and others made when getting started, the key lessons I have learned, and the potential impact we can make by supporting founders. I am incredibly thankful to Luis Almanza for giving me the honor of hosting the group and to Eduardo Ramirez Diaz for making the intro to Luis. I look forward to getting even more involved with the Tecnológico de Monterrey community in Mexico and in Silicon Valley! Roberto Serrano, Oscar Emilio Corral Amaya, Fabián Alejandro Collazo Gama, Daniel Villanueva, Javier Villalobos Plasencia, Jose Ildefonso Sepulveda Perez, Emilio Allande Guadalajara, Francisco Ruiz Terrazas, Ricardo Succar, Carlos Rousseau