Follow the biggest innovators and tech founders in Latin America as they cover valuable insights and inspire entrepreneurs facing challenges in scaling their business and raising capital. Presented by Brian Requarth, Co-founder at Latitud. 

Latitud Podcast

Over the last few years, Latin America has been seeing more and more people interested in founding a startup. To them, Freddy Vega has one advice: don't do it.

The deterrence may sound strange, especially coming from someone who is a natural born entrepreneur. Freddy started at age 16, when he created what became the largest community of developers in Latin America, Cristalab. He had learned how to program by himself 3 years prior, on a borrowed Casio calculator.

After meeting Christian Van Der Henst, who led an equally successful initiative in education, they decided to merge their communities. Soon after, they started hosting live educational shows every Thursday, which ultimately evolved into Platzi: an online learning platform offering courses in technology, business and several other categories. With millions of students across Latin America, it bets on teaching saleable skills fast and on a huge scale, while also seeding a lifelong-learning attitude.

Fun fact, Platzi was the first company with a Latin American market to ever go to YC, in 2015.

How to build psychological safety within a company

And how to unleash the power of community

Starting something new?
Apply at apply.latitud.com

Building the largest tech school in Latin America: Freddy Vega, Platzi

From a young age, Martin Schrimpff was always looking for entrepreneurial opportunities, whether that was selling chocolate or doing raffles at school. His first official business, though, was founded right after university: a software development company called Sirius.

It was at Sirius that Martin and his partner were asked to build a payment system for a friend's company – "something like PayPal for Colombia," he said. They had never heard the name "PayPal" before, so Martin looked it up, only to find out it had been recently sold to Ebay for 1.5 billion dollars. His first thought? "If they can do it, so can we!"

The mix of ambition and naiveté originated PayU, which became a global business and was eventually acquired by Naspers at a 1 billion dollar valuation. But Martin never stopped founding companies after the exit. Later came other successful startups like Zinobe, Centeo and, most recently, Kocomo: a transparent marketplace that empowers people to co-own their dream vacation homes.

Stick around to learn:

The two most game-changing moments for PayU

How his experience bootstrapping compares with starting venture-backed companies

The backstage of Kocomo's recent pre-seed round of $56M

And his advice on fundraising to early-stage founders

Dealing with a chip on your shoulder: Martin Schrimpff, Kocomo

Born in Brazil, Iona Szkurnik arrived in California 8 years ago. After graduating from Stanford University as a Lemann Fellow, she worked at a couple of Silicon Valley companies and taught at Menlo Park and Palo Alto public-school district. Iona is the co-founder and board member of Brazil at Silicon Valley and PortPy, a project aimed at making coding in Python more accessible to Brazilian youth.

Last year, she also started Education Journey, a startup focused on making innovation core in education. Married and a passionate mother of two teenagers, Iona cannot live without hiking, the ocean, and ice cream.

Starting something new?
Apply at apply.latitud.com

Altitud | Iona Szkurnik from Education Journey and aggregating the most innovative edtechs in one place

What does it take for Latin America to have the next Nelson Mandela, Greta Thunberg, or a few thousand more David Vélez?

LALA, the Latin American Leadership Academy, believes it's about unleashing the potential in young people and bringing them together. Seeking to promote sustainable economic development and strengthen democratic governance, LALA is finding, developing and connecting a new generation of entrepreneurial, principled, impact-focused leaders for the region.

Diego Ontaneda has seen it work. Originally from Peru, in 2013 he joined the African Leadership Academy, and became determined to adapt the model to LatAm. After completing an MBA from Stanford, he was introduced to educator David Baptista and found in him the ideal founding partner to build LALA. With over 15 years of experience, David chose this path inspired by his own family's story of breaking the cycle of poverty through education.

How the Theory of Change and Systems Thinking are applied at LALA

How to measure your Social Return on Investment

Developing the future leaders of LatAm: Diego Ontaneda & David Baptista, LALA

Salvador Rivero is a self-proclaimed fintech geek. Born and raised in Mexico City, he's trained in Political Science and Finance at Science-Po in France. With 9 years of experience in the investment industry, he allocated more than $1.5B USD in Latam equity markets.

As a 3rd-time founder, he now joins forces with Max Mergenthaler, also 3rd-time founder, to build the high yield savings account for Mexico. Levo started last year and it's already backed by Latitud, Y Combinator, Magma Partners, and BackBone Ventures.

Starting something new?
Apply at apply.latitud.com

Altitud | Salvador Rivero from Levo and building a high-yield savings account for Mexico

When he was 12, David Vélez made his first investment: a cow. Bought with birthday money and savings from summer jobs, that one cow eventually became six, which were then sold and turned into his college tuition at Stanford.

After graduating, David spent a few years working at investment banking and private equity before he joined Sequoia Capital. As Partner, he was responsible for all Latin American investments, leading him to move to Brazil in 2011. But shortly after that, Sequoia decided to pull back: the tech space was just not developed enough.

David saw that as an opportunity. This time, as an entrepreneur. Nubank is a pioneer in digital banking, even though it doesn't see itself as a bank. Rather, it's a tech company that happens to be in financial services. Now valued at 30 billion dollars, Nubank is one of the fastest-growing fintechs in the world, with operations in Brazil, Mexico, Argentina and Colombia.

David is a father of three, a marathon runner, and him and his wife Mariel recently signed the Giving Pledge, committing to donate the majority of their wealth to philanthropy.

How he manages his time as cofounder and CEO

The most culture-defining moments at Nubank

How to balance speed, growth and quality in the long term

And some of the curve balls that could've changed this entire story.

Apply for the Latitud fellowship at: apply.latitud.com

Building a $30 billion "skyscraper": David Vélez, Nubank

About 6 years ago, Pamela Valdés was faced with an important choice between a full scholarship for university in the US or dropping out to get her business off the ground. As you may have guessed, the latter won. 

That was the birth of Beek, a startup created to be the top audio platform in Latin America. 

Originally from Mexico, Pamela was part of YC in 2017 and got investments from VC firms like Greylock and Accel. Outside of work, Pamela enjoys surfing and, of course, listening to audiobooks. Over 50 a year.

How Beek pivoted and evolved along the journey

The importance of managing herself as the company grows

Pivoting to success: Pamela Valdés, Beek

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