LatAm Venture Bulletin
| > OLX, a global classifieds marketplace backed by Naspers, has made a R$2.9b (~US$642m) all cash offer to acquire Brazilian real estate classifieds platform GrupoZAP, subject to approval by CADE. VivaReal merged with Globo’s ZAP in 2017, combining the two biggest players in Brazil. Lucas Vargas has served as CEO of the combined entity, which also includes Geoimovel, Suahouse, Sub100, and DataZAP. OLX also merged with or acquired Properati’s Latin American operations over the past two years. > #CVC XP led a R$380m investment in Brazilian car rental platform Vai.Car, with participation from BTG Pactual (through its Boostlab program), BMG, and Bossa Nova Investimentos. > #CVC BTG Pactual acquired a 20% stake in CredPago, a Brazilian real estate financial services platform. > Atlantico led a R$42m investment in Trybe, a Brazilian edtech focused on software skills development, with participation from Canary, Global Founders Capital, and Norte, as well as follow-on from e.bricks Ventures and MAYA Capital. Angels ArmÃnio Fraga and Ronaldo Lemos invested previously in the seed round. > #HEALTH #CVC Redpoint eventures and DNA Capital, the corporate venture arm of DASA, led a US$4.5m investment in Memed, a Brazilian digital prescription platform. Qualcomm Ventures, monashees, and Redpoint invested previously. > #HEALTH e.bricks Ventures made an undisclosed seed investment in Conexa Saúde, a Brazilian telemedicine platform. e.bricks and angels invested R$5m previously. > NXTP Ventures led a R$6m seed investment in Kangu, a Brazilian delivery logistics startup. > Telor and Morcote Holdings led a R$5.5m investment in Click Cash, a Brazilian personal credit app. > #AGTECH ðŸ ChileGlobal Ventures led a US$800k investment in Chilean agtech PolyNatural, with participation from Alerce and TheYieldLab. PolyNatural is developing natural product alternatives to extend the shelf life of fresh fruit. > Angel Ventures and Fen Ventures led a US$600k seed investment in Get on Board, a Chilean platform for tech jobs, with participation from 500 Startups San Francisco, 500 Startups Mexico, and angels. This is the company’s first disclosed financing. Co-Founder & CEO Sergio Novel says Get on Board is strongest in Chile and Peru, and growing rapidly in Colombia, Argentina, and Mexico: “We have 120K tech professionals in our network… The demand for tech professionals is growing 5% yearly just in Latin America, and it’s only going to get more aggressive as US companies start accessing this talent pool.†> #IMPACT Adobe Capital made an undisclosed investment in Puntored, a Colombian digital payments platform. > #IMPACT #HEALTH Cicero Impact Capital and Promotora Social Mexico will invest up to US$4m in Medica Santa Carmen, a Mexican network of dialysis clinics. ALLVP invested previously. > #DEBT Kenoby, a Brazilian SaaS platform for employee recruitment, raised R$3.3m from Brazil Venture Debt I. Kenoby recently raised R$20m from Astella Investimentos. > Distrito Ventures invested R$3m across Brazilian fintechs Atta, BLU365, and SuperSim. Undisclosed investors contributed an additional R$9m. > ChoppUp, a Brazilian IoT startup that partners with beer distributors, raised R$600k from undisclosed investors. ChoppUp raised R$4m from FINEP and others in 2019. > #IMPACT #DEBT BWISE, a mobile commerce platform for micro-enterprises in Ecuador, raised US$1m in debt financing from Alphamundi.
> Zubut, a Mexican last mile delivery platform, raised undisclosed financing from Redwood Ventures and others. > #HEALTH Hisnëk, a Brazilian employee health platform, raised R$1m in angel financing. > #HEALTH Brazilian healthtech Ninsaúde raised undisclosed financing from undisclosed investors.
> VC investment in Latin American startups has quadrupled since 2016 to a record US$2b in 2018, according to LAVCA data. Access LAVCA’s Annual Review of Tech Investment in Latin America for the details.
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| > QED Investors closed its sixth fund with US$350m in commitments. QED's Latin America portfolio includes Nubank, QuintoAndar, Creditas, Konfio, and others. > #IMPACT Quona Capital closed its second fund with US$203m in commitments. The fund’s anchor investor, sponsor, and general partner is Accion and the capital will be used to target financial inclusion startups in emerging markets. Investments in Latin America to-date include Contabilizei, Klar, Kovi, BizCapital, Invoinet, Neon, and Creditas. Founding Partner Monica Brand Engel is on LAVCA’s list of Top Women Investing in Latin American Tech. > Magma Partners closed its third fund with US$50m in commitments, including US$4m from IDB Lab, to invest in Latin American startups. > Atomico, Skype, and Lime alums are launching a VC vehicle called Ozone Latam Ventures with a US$100m target. > Angel Ventures announced plans to raise a Guadalajara fund. > Company builder Rubik Ventures plans to invest US$20m in Colombian projects. > A number of Brazilian education industry executives have partnered with Bossa Nova Investimentos on a R$5m pool of capital to make seed investments in edtech startups. |
| > M&A Gym membership unicorn ClassPass is expanding in the region through acquisitions of MuvPass (Chile) and ClickyPass (Argentina). > #M&A #EXIT Retail anti-fraud platform ClearSale acquired Brazilian startup Send4, providing an exit to 500 Startups. > #M&A Brazilian proptech Loft acquired market research provider Spry. > Chilean foodtech NotCo is powering Burger King’s new plant-based burger at locations across the US. CEO Matias Muchnick shares:
"Today we comply with our founding promise, to create products that REALLY move the needle: creating a new mindset, impacting exponentially in protecting the environment, in creating a more efficient and nutritious food industry, helping reduce climate change and defending animal rights. That’s what NotCo is all about."
> Congrats to FitCo, a Peruvian software platform for fitness centers, for joining Techstars accelerator program in Boulder, Colorado. FitCo raised a seed round with Angel Ventures to expand in Mexico. Founder Andrea Baba shares: “Mexico now represents 50% of our whole operation, both customers and revenue. We established our commercial HQ and have a team of 15 in CDMX, centralizing our tech and product team in Lima (10).†> Neofeed looks at Lalamove’s entry in the Brazilian logistics market. Lalamove (formerly EasyVan) is a Hong Kong-based startup with almost US$500m in funding from Sequoia Capital China and others. > TechCrunch reports the CEO of Homie has resigned over allegations of sexual harassment. > Check out LAVCA’s directory of 331 Latin American startups with at least US$1m in VC funding, verified by LAVCA (as of end-2018), our Unicorn Leaderboard, and our Inaugural Survey of Latin American Startups. |
| > WhatsApp’s dominance in Brazil continues: Pretty much everyone with a smartphone is using the app on a daily basis. > #POLICY Mexico’s Ley del Fintech is undergoing modifications, with new open banking regulations expected in the coming year. > #POLICY Uber re-launched in Colombia with a slightly different product after closing down in December in response to a ruling from the Superintendency of Industry and Commerce (SIC). |
| > #CVC Since the 2011 launch of Wayra and the Telefonica Innovation funds (Axon Partners in Colombia, InvestTech in Brazil, and Scale Capital in Chile), Telefonica has emerged as one of the most active investors in Latin American startups, with over €20m invested over the past nine years, and €1.37m invested across 16 deals in 2019. Check out a full recap of 2019 activity here. > The IFC, Village Capital, and Women Entrepreneurs Finance Initiative (We-Fi) published a new report on the role of accelerators in the gender financing gap for female-led startups. “We see that male-led startups, on average, increase the amount of equity they raise post-acceleration by 2.6 times as much as female-led startups.†> AgFunder’s 2019 agrifood report indicates 40% growth in Latin America (by deals) and a record US$1.4b invested in 2019 (including outlier Rappi’s US$1b round). > Colombia, Mexico, and Brazil make Crunchbase’s new list of where startup funding is taking off. |
| PEOPLE & PROGRAMS > VCs and Brazil's top tech players can now register for LAVCA Encontro Anual Brasil, an annual, invitation-only meeting scheduled for April 22 in São Paulo. 🔥 This year's program includes a keynote fireside chat with Quinn Li, Global Head of Qualcomm Ventures. Additional discussion leaders and topics to be announced. ðŸ½ï¸ LAVCA members are invited to a private member-only dinner hosted by Microsoft following the meeting. Thanks to our partners Qualcomm Ventures as well as Latin American Tech Growth Coalition members SVB, Google, Facebook, AWS, Microsoft, SoftBank, Visa, and Wayra; in addition to ABVCAP. REGISTER HERE. Registration subject to approval. Contact Kaela Kennedy (kkennedy@lavca.org) to see if you qualify to attend. > Globant is accepting applications for its corporate accelerator. Google for Startups is accepting applications for its LatAm and Brazil acceleration programs. Google and Globant are members of the Latin American Tech Growth Coalition to support high-growth startups in the region. > Investors from MAYA Capital, Canary, Astella, Innova Capital, Positive Ventures, Wayra, Google, 500 Startups, and others are offering free mentoring for female entrepreneurs through Female Force LATAM. If you’re in São Paulo, join MAYA Capital and Female Force LatAm for cocktails on March 4 with Claudia Sender (Latam Airlines), Sandra Costa (Grupo Sabin), Mariana Paixao (Loft), and Luciana Caletti (LoveMondays, Glassdoor). RSVP here. > Endeavor Chile hosts Experiencia Endeavor Santiago 2020 on March 31-April 1 in Santiago de Chile. Startups who want to participate in speed sessions with investors can apply by March 20. > BHP and ChileGlobal Ventures are looking to support projects focused on climate change, including decentralized energy and infrastructure. Apply by March 29. |
| > Manoel Lemos of Redpoint eventures on Brazilian healthtech, following the firm’s recent investment in Memed with DNA Capital:
"I believe that healthtech may have an impact as profound as the one we saw in the fintech space. But it has its own pace due to intrinsic complexities of health systems. All transactions comprehend multiple participants with incentives not always aligned, and the amount of data represented in those transactions are immense; it is one of the most complex areas for computing. On top of that, you have the regulatory framework and the sensitivity of the data.
On the other hand, the world urging for disruption in healthcare. It is happening and it is gaining momentum. Memed is part of that. It took them years to build a comprehensive prescription solution and to make more than 10,000 doctors adopt it while doing more than half a million prescriptions monthly. They have built a tremendous piece of infrastructure and now they are using it to deliver higher value added applications. I'm excited about it."
> #IMPACT Fortune: Responsible investing is a rare field of finance led by women.
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| > NYTimes explores coronavirus surveillance in China with a new app from Alipay. “The coronavirus outbreak is proving to be one of those landmarks in the history of the spread of mass surveillance in China.†|
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