Come to the dark side

Hello there, glamorous founder who took an extra holiday week and has been checking 350+ emails since Monday. Kkkrying.

It's officially that time of the year when you start neglecting the wishes you made by eating the 12 grapes at the New Year's celebration 🍇

What, so soon?

Or are you elaborating a plan for them to come true? Mm?

We hope that AT LEAST ONE of your grapes was destined to taking your entrepreneurial journey to the next level — 'cause otherwise… Why are you here?

About that wish, we would like to offer our version of gold, incense, and myrrh to help you achieve it (yeah, we're feeling holy today).

What is it?

✨ A new beginning. ✨ Wow.

The Explore Fellowship, our flagship program built to connect a community of high-caliber Latin American entrepreneurs is, once again, offering the opportunity to:

• Receive weekly words of wisdom from world-class mentors and speakers;
• Prepare your pitch and fundraising strategy to shine like the star you are;
• Belong to a warm community of LatAm founders who only fight over who has the best food (it's Peru).

🚀 That's right. Applications for the 10th cohort of the Explore Fellowship are now OPEN.

‍(The 10th cohort! 10. Like Messi. Lucky number. Just saying.)

We want a breathtaking application explaining how MAJESTIC you are, ok Virginia? 🦄

State of mind for 2023

In short:

But it's fine…

Martin Escobari, co-president of General Atlantic and winner of 2022's most listened to Latitud Podcast episode shiny badge 🥇, stated the following:

"Years in Latin America as an entrepreneur are like dog years: each one's actually worth 7. We hit a great financial crisis every 2 to 3 years. So you have a pattern of recognition and none of these crises scare you anymore.

My insight is that, as long as you stay alive, you survive through the winter and spring comes. And that peace of mind, to assure entrepreneurs that no matter how dark the winter looks spring will come and run its course, is comforting."

If you're an early-stage founder working on your first venture, we get that Martin's zero fear of death and soothing wisdom is something you could only be dreaming of having sooner than later. But you can't deny that the zen mode displayed lately by some of the top voices in the ecosystem is working like THE SLAP IN THE FACE you didn't know you needed to get your sh*t together.

Yes, 2023 is going to be tough. The question this time is not why Latin America always has to suffer – although it is a valid question – but what are you gonna do about it? How are you gonna face this scenario?

HOW, DAVID?

For Martin, the true heroes of the story are the entrepreneurs, not the investors. The folks that are fighting the fight, talking the talk, and walking the walk. (We mean you.)

So what do LatAm founders keep in mind when things heat up? Y'know, like right now.

Santiago Sosa, from Nuvemshop, says that in times like these, we must keep our customers as close to us as possible.

"We're going to be facing uncertain times. Checking how our customers are and how we can help them become more successful is going to be very relevant and it can be easily overlooked."

For Ricardo Moguel from Clivi, it's all about the mission and, of course, unit economics.

"We shouldn't forget why we started. That's super, super important. The mission should make sense at least for the next 50 years. (...) We have to keep focused on industry trends, what are those milestones we need to validate.

Founders should be laser-focused on burn rate and growth. And then unit economics, unit economics, improve the unit economics."

(Good thing you do know how to take care of your Unit Economics, right?)

👉 What are the founders of Pomelo, Morado, Addi, and other startups keeping in mind?

Listen to their statements and grab their ideas on where opportunities are for LatAm founders in this quick 15 minutes episode (perfect length for finally cleaning the dishes that have been in your sink since New Year's Eve)

Put on your best suits

2023 brings some IRL events for our community 🥂

We know you've been invited to every fiesta latina out there Andres, and now there's not a spot left on your Calendly anymore. My, my…

Any chance you can squish us in and BOOST the glam in our pics?

For this year, we already have 2 major events confirmed:

🇲🇽 March 23 – Launchpad Mexico City:

We're bringing it back to our roots and hosting an invite-only community event for all major players in the Mexican tech scene. If you are one of them and want your name on the list, join our Public All Hands on January 31st to learn how you can be part of the Latitud community.

🇧🇷 September 28-29 – Vamos Latam Summit São Paulo:

We'll host another big bash in São Paulo, and everyone will be welcome to join in on the fun. You can pre-register now – 9 months in advance – in this beautiful blue link.

Save the date and come dance Macarena with us! 🕺

And about the suit: come as you are, but if this means showing off the VC's style with a Patagonia vest AGAIN, you'll become our personal meme. No room for complaints.

⛵ Hot News Ahoy!

🏥 A healthy panorama

Chilean-born HealthAtom secures a US$10M Series A led by Kayyak Ventures to improve access to healthcare in Latin America

💸 Amplo acquires Velum Ventures

Amplo, a fund management company in Colombia focused on impact investment projects, acquired 100% of the shares of Velum Ventures, a VC fund based in Medellin, with which it expects to mobilize resources of more than US$38 million.

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