All posts tagged advisor

  • November 26, 2016

    TropicalGringo Portfolio continues to ROCK as 2017 rolls in

    TropicalGringo Portfolio 2016I can’t believe we’ve reached the end of the year already. It’s either that I’ve had too much fun this year or that I’m getting older; I’ll choose to kid myself and think that it’s the former.  My work within BBVA’s New Digital Business unit has been incredibly rewarding this year.  Besides working on an important deal with some incredible startup founders, I’ve met startups in Mexico, Brazil, Argentina and Chile.

    Fortunately, during some moments of downtime (e.g., at night, etc.), I reap tremendous satisfaction from being an Advisor and shareholder of four awesome startups that each have exciting news (e.g., one closed a Series A round of funding and all are growing internationally with one of these launching in UC Berkeley): 1Doc3, Vendty, Acsendo and Kiwi Campus (I maintain close contact with a fifth one, Tappsi, that already had an exit). As readers of this blog know, I presumptuously call this group of startups the TropicalGringo Portfolio.

    Read more

    No Comments / English, General /

  • June 26, 2016

    Mi vision del futuro en WOBI TV

    Tropicalgringo Wobi TV
    Hace un tiempo atrás, cambié mi adicción a la televisión por la adicción a YouTube.  Lo malo de esto es que no tengo un paquete de TV cable muy premium y, por ende, no puedo ver un canal llamado WOBI TV.  Hoy, un amigo, Arnulfo Ospina, CEO de Vendty (soy Advisor de su startup), me acaba de enviar una porción de la entrevista (grabado en su movíl) que hice para este canal hace aproximadamente diez meses.   A diferencia de mi entrevista en CNN, en esta conversación presenté más de mi visión sobre el futuro tomando como contexto la acelerada adopción de dispositivos moviles inteligentes.

    En ese entonces, yo estaba ejecutando mi rol como Advisor y Vice Presidente Ejecutivo de uno de los startups mas exitosos que haya salido de Colombia llamado Tappsi, la cual como he mencionado antes fue adquirida por un startup mas grande.  Aunque me ayudaria ver la entrevista para ayudar a mi memoria, hay algunos conceptos que recuerdo habiendo tocado durante dicha entrevsita.

    Read more

    4 Comments / Español, General /

  • January 8, 2016

    TropicalGringo Portfolio: Tappsi exit good news for ecosystem

    Tappsi ExitAs some of you know, one of the startups that I advise is Tappsi, the leading taxi-hailing company in Colombia. Recently, the company announced their merger with Easy Taxi.  Not only is this a good outcome for the company’s talented founders, shareholders (such as myself) and the Colombian startup ecosystem (particularly, for investors and potential investors), but it is a logical next step in the company’s evolution and allows it to play the long (regional) game as part of bigger company.

    Though this outcome may have been a surprise to some, it was a scenario that the founders (and myself) always saw as one of several probabilities down the road. This space was quite obviously destined for consolidation (especially, from a regional perspective).  In such a market, as many know, you can be the consolidator of several markets (countries) or, if you can build dominance in one lucrative market (country), you can, later, join forces with that same consolidator through a merger, acquisition, etc.

    Read more

    2 Comments / Case Studies, English /

  • November 20, 2013

    An “accelerator” for Latin American angel investors

    Latam Incubated OneIf you attend any conference on Latin American startups or startup investing, you indubitably will here someone talk about the lack of local angel investing in early stage startups.  Such an utterance will usually get a lot of heads nodding in acceptance of this problem.  What’s not usual is to encounter new options created to solve this problem, but I’d say that is what SSX, an early stage company stock exchange, which is also part of the Dutch Caribbean Securities Exchange, has done with Latam Incubated One.  This new offering allows potential angels to invest the amount of money they wish (starting at $2) in a liquid vehicle (traded shares) that will provide much more learning than they’d get trying to choose one startup investment for themselves.

    On the learning front, angel investors wishing to get started in startup investing can make one investment in Latam Incubated One and distribute their exposure across several investments.  Latam Incubated One will invest (from $50k on up) alongside some of the top accelerators in Latin America which include Wayra, 500 Startups in Mexico, 21212 in Brazil and NXTP in Argentina.  The investments will be made in startups that graduate from one of these accelerators’ programs.  Additionally, investment decisions will be made by investment committees with regional advisors of which I am one.

    Read more

    8 Comments / English, General /