Crossing Borders With Nathan Lustig

Santiago Aparicio, Ontop: Transforming the future of work, Ep 158   The future of work is going to be remote and decentralized, according to Santiago Aparicio, Co-Founder and CEO of Ontop, a payroll software startup that allows companies to legally hire and pay anyone in the world. Santiago is a serial entrepreneur and sales passionate who believes in the influence of developing markets in defining the future of work.     After long nights working on Excel sheets back in his banking days, Santiago decided he wanted a change. He reached out to Felipe Villamarin, co-founder at Rappi, and joined the team as its seventh employee, which really helped him to become an entrepreneur.   I sat down with Santiago to talk about his experience as an entrepreneur, while Santiago shared the story of Ontop and their meteoric growth in their first fifteen months (actively operating in over 190 countries, transacting over $2M per month). Fundraising and starting his first two companies For Santiago, the next frontier as a sal

Maricel Saenz, Compound Foods: Coffee without Coffee Beans, Ep 157 People continue to experience how global warming can have devastating effects on the world. Crop yields have already started to decline from rising temperatures, changes in rainfall patterns and extreme weather events. Climate change is threatening the future of many foods, and that includes coffee. This threat and her love for coffee inspired Maricel Saenz to launch Compound Foods, a food science company to reinvent coffee. Originally from Costa Rica, where coffee is ingrained in the national identity, Maricel wanted to dedicate her time and energy to creating solutions fighting climate change. Maricel left her first startup to create a product that could recreate coffee in a sustainable way. Coffee is one of the most consumed products in the world and it comes with a large water footprint. Maricel’s idea for Compound Foods is to replicate the coffee experience with less environmental impact. In this episode, I sat down with Maricel to talk

Juanma Gironella, Guros: Reshaping The Latin American Insurance Industry, Ep 156   The traditional insurance experience in Latin America is an inefficient, non tech process. Most people don’t want to buy it but know they have to. At the same time, customer expectations of instant digital transactions sustained seamlessly across digital channels are increasingly the norm. This is exactly what Juanma Gironella is providing with Guros, the operating system for insurance in Latin America.    After working in financial services consulting, Juanma decided to build digital tools to help bring the insurance industry into the digital age.    In this episode, I sat down with Juanma to discuss how Guros is making inroads into the insurance industry and gaining market share with a digital model that is democratizing access to insurance and bringing new opportunities to innovate, improve customer experience, and ultimately, driving growth.   Improving the insurance experience Juanma contrasts the experience of comparing a

Caterine Castillo, Neivor: Streamlining real estate administration in Latin America, Ep 153   In Latin America, a building manager typically has to handle thousands of apartment units and tenants. This means simultaneously dealing with building maintenance, reconciling payments, and meeting tenant and landlord requests. Currently, this is done manually with pen and paper, maybe an Excel spreadsheet or through WhatsApp which leads to inefficiencies and unhappy residents.    Caterine Castillo, Neivor’s co-founder and CEO, is trying to make living in Latin America’s apartment buildings and condos better. Neivor is a vertical SaaS platform that simplifies condo fee collections and streamlines management and communication between residents, property owners, and building managers. Neivor processes tens of millions of payments per month and help manage 3000+ apartment buildings in Mexico, Colombia, and Ecuador.   I sat down with Caterine to talk about the pain points of property management in Latin America and the d

Gonzalo Blanco, Quansa: Building the future of financial health in Latin America, Ep 152   For years, Gonzalo Blanco and Mafalda Barros have seen how the misaligned incentives in Latin American financial products push the average person to make bad financial decisions. Due to this lack of guidance, people improvise and spend money without realizing the impact that their decisions have on their financial health.    This frustration with the lack of financial education led them to found Quansa, a corporate benefits platform focused on employee financial wellbeing. We invested in Quansa’s last round and are excited to support them on their mission to promote employee financial health throughout the region.   In this episode, I sat down with Gonzalo to talk about why the incentives in Latin American financial products are broken and how Quansa aims to change that. Gonzalo also shares his lessons learned from working in the corporate world, participating in Pear.vc’s accelerator, and going through the fundraising

Greatest Hits Episode: Marta Forero, Driving Economic Growth in Latin America via Corporate Education with UBits, Ep 149 ​​For this week’s episode of Crossing Borders, we’re revisiting one of our greatest hits episodes featuring UBits’ Marta Forero.   As the only Latin American woman in her Y Combinator cohort, Marta Forero is helping break the mold for women in the tech industry. From a young age, she knew she wanted to make an impact on the world. After university, she took a high-paying job, which she then left to start a business of her own, combining her passion for education for transformative growth with a love of technology to create an online university.   The result was UBits, a corporate online learning platform headquartered in Bogota, that Marta co-founded with Julián Melo. UBits, which also operates in Mexico and Peru, focuses on training based on bits– small training units created by industry experts…hence The University of Bits or UBits. UBits offers corporate training in Spanish in Business,

Maribel Dominguez, Círculo de Belleza: Building a vertical marketplace to supply the professional beauty industry, Ep 150 After graduating from university in the US in 2009 at the height of the financial crisis, Maribel Dominguez decided to move back to her native Mexico until the economy got better. While she was home, Maribel and her dad came up with a business idea. They identified a problem that affects many industries: excess inventory. Together, they decided to found a company that helped corporations sell company’s surplus stock and landed star clients like L’Oreal and United Colors of Benetton.   That company she founded with her dad in 2009 would set the foundation for the eleven-year journey that would lead to Maribel founding Círculo de Belleza, a specialized B2B marketplace that supplies beauty salons and independent hairstylists.    I sat down with Maribel to talk about why the distribution system in the professional beauty market is broken and the enormous opportunity it presents in an industr

Greatest Hits Episode: Matías Rivera, Building Businesses and Replanting Patagonian Trees, Ep 149 ​​For this week’s episode of Crossing Borders, we’re revisiting one of our greatest hits episodes featuring Fanatiz’ Matías Rivera.   What do Start-Up Chile, the Copa Libertadores, and Latin America’s largest crowdfunding campaign have in common? The answer is that Chilean entrepreneur and philanthropist, Matias Rivera, had some hand in their development. Matias loves to solve problems he sees at home or abroad. Once he sees a need, he tries to create a simple and effective solution. With that methodology, Matias has founded five ventures, including his most recent startup, Fanatiz, which received investment from investors including Magma Partners. Now based in Miami, Matias has specialized in creating clever solutions in his native Chile and quickly bringing them to a global audience. I sat down with Matias on this episode of Crossing Borders to talk about his decision to get an MBA at Stanford, his work at Sta

Benjamin Labra, Houm: Streamlining the Real Estate industry in Latin America, Ep 148   Latin America’s real estate market is opaque, broken and bureaucratic. The home buying process in the region can take up to a year, and even just renting an apartment requires having another property as collateral in some countries. There are many pain points in the industry that are being unaddressed by the market.   That’s why Benjamin Labra is looking to fix the broken real estate industry in Latin America with Houm, an end-to-end solution helping property owners rent, manage and sell their properties through an online marketplace.   I sat down with Benjamin to talk about how he’s tackling some of the industry’s deepest-rooted problems and streamlining the home buying and renting process in the region. We also discuss his experience at Y Combinator and how to build and maintain company culture once you go remote. Real estate runs in the family Real estate runs through Benjamin’s veins. He comes from two generations of Ch

​​Nico Barawid, Casai: Providing Consistently High-Quality Hospitality in Mexico, Ep 147   In Mexico, the hospitality industry is the third-highest contributor to GDP. Therefore, when COVID-19 initially shut tourists out of the country and forced many hotels to close down, the Mexican economy was hit relatively hard. By the second half of 2020, travel to Mexico was picking up, and the hospitality industry is ready to make a comeback, with some Mexico destinations on pace for more travel than in 2019!   Casai, a luxury hospitality startup, aims to be the high end Airbnb for digital nomads, high end business travelers and families. In this episode of Crossing Borders I sat down with Casai’s founder and CEO Nico Barawid to learn more about his story.   Starting with his first job at a startup in San Francisco and his background in consulting, Nico explains how these experiences prepared him to run Casai efficiently. We also discuss the difficulties Casai faced during the pandemic and Nico explains the ways in wh

Greatest Hits Episode: Daniel Bilbao, Fighting Fraud in Latin America, Ep 146 For this week’s episode of Crossing Borders, we’re revisiting one of our greatest hits episodes featuring Truora’s Daniel Bilbao.   Originally from Cali, Colombia, Daniel studied in the US and started a company in Silicon Valley before realizing he wanted to use his experience to solve a pressing Latin American problem: fraud. Truora, a startup that provides instant background checks, was born to fight that problem. I sat down with Daniel for this episode to talk about why he decided to go after the Latin American market instead of Silicon Valley, how he raised money from Y Combinator, Accel, and Kaszek Ventures, and why he wants to tackle the problem of fraud in Latin America. We also discuss why he based his company in Cali and the lessons he learned building and working for three startups in Latin America and Silicon Valley. Magma has been supporting Truora since before YCombinator, so I’m especially excited to share the story o

Greatest Hits Episode: Federico Vega, Transforming Transport Logistics in Latin America, Ep 145 For this week’s episode of Crossing Borders we’re revisiting one of our greatest hits episodes featuring Cargo X’s Federico Vega.   Anytime you have an item that you need to send from here to there you enter the world of transport logistics. It may seem as simple as calling UPS or FedEx, but there’s a lot more that goes into it for the companies that provide the service, not to mention, freight companies delivering all around the country. In Latin America, things get even more complicated. In Brazil, for example, 40% of the trucks that are on the road delivering packages and freight are not full. That’s a terrible use of the transport logistics resources that are available. When my guest today, Federico Vega, realized that, he saw an incredible opportunity to solve a problem and create a dynamic company. Through patience, perseverance, and iterations, Federico has built CargoX from the ground up – it’s the Uber for

Pedro Moura, Flourish: Building the tech infrastructure to help people make better financial decisions, Ep 144   Pedro Moura moved from Natal, Brazil to the US at a young age, overcoming many challenges while always trying to build a better future for himself, his family and his region. His perseverance and grit guided him to create a company that he is truly passionate about. In this episode of Crossing Borders, Pedro tells the story of his career path and how taking a risk on what he really believed in led him to found Flourish, a B2B SaaS company that empowers people to establish positive money habits.    In this episode, I sat down with Pedro to discuss how he landed on the idea for Flourish, what companies can do to attract foreign talent, and how to think of a business from a global perspective.  Finding a fit in financial inclusion Pedro’s story is truly inspirational. He moved to Northern California from Brazil when he was young, and his mother worked tirelessly for the family. Pedro attended UC Davis

Alexander Torrenegra, Torre: Reinventing job-matching and recruitment services, Ep 143   Alexander Torrenegra believes that most talent is going to waste because it’s not being exposed to the right opportunities. That’s why he founded Torre, a platform that streamlines the application, recruitment, and selection process for remote work. This new professional network matches the best talent in Latin America with companies around the world.   Before Torre, Alexander co-founded and bootstrapped Voice123 and BunnyStudio, forever transforming the voice acting industry. He’s also been an angel investor with his wife for over two decades, won many entrepreneurship awards, and written several practical guides.    I sat down with Alexander to talk about his entrepreneurial trajectory from getting a loan from a bank at 14 years old with his first business, to moving from his native Colombia to the US and eventually founding Torre. We also discuss Voice 123’s business model and the benefits of bootstrapping a company. G

Pete Flint, NFX: Tapping into world-class startups in Latin America, Ep 142   During the summer of ‘95, when Netscape went public, Pete Flint decided he wanted to get involved in Internet startups as the next step in his career. He went on to form part of the founding team of lastminute.com in the UK– an online travel site that was later acquired for over $1B.    With his eyes set on Silicon Valley, Pete eventually made his way over to the US and founded Trulia, one of the largest and fastest growing real estate websites in the US that merged with Zillow. Today, Pete is on the other side of the investment table as General Partner at NFX, a Seed and Series A venture firm based in San Francisco.   I sat down with Pete to talk about what it was like founding startups in different Internet eras and why he decided to make the jump into Latin America with NFX. Pete also provides advice to founders for overcoming crises, having experienced himself running a travel company during 9/11 and a real estate company during

Bismarck Lepe, Wizeline: Building world class startups from Mexico and Silicon Valley , Ep 141   Bismarck Lepe was part of the first batch of entrepreneurs to leave Google, ready to take the world by storm. And that he did. His first startup was Ooyala, an online video platform company that he built from zero to a $400M exit.    Today, a seasoned entrepreneur, Bismarck is President and CEO at Wizeline, a global product development company that helps its clients solve their biggest challenges with design and technology.    I sat down with Bismarck to talk about his nomadic childhood between the US and Jalisco in Mexico and how he veered from wanting to study medicine to taking an interest in tech startups and eventually founding his own. We also discuss the harsh truths about what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur and how Guadalajara’s tech ecosystem has evolved over the years.  Stories around entrepreneurship in the media Bismarck explains that being the first is always the hardest. When Bismarck launc

David Poritz, Credijusto: Helping SMEs grow in Latin America, Ep 140 According to David Poritz, over six million SMEs in Mexico have historically lacked access to credit. That’s one of the reasons why in 2015, David decided to build Credijusto, a tech-enabled lender for SMEs in Mexico.   David has always been a strong advocate for human rights, founding his own non profit early in his career. In his quest to build a social enterprise that would promote economic development while supporting a good cause, he discovered the power of fintechs and the potential to stimulate growth in emerging markets.   I sat down with David to talk about how the SME lending space in Mexico has evolved since 2015 and the impact COVID-19 has had at Credijusto. We also talk about David’s lessons learned from the nonprofit sector and why working with impact investors is such an important part of Credijusto’s trajectory.  Going into tech with a social science background Before venturing into tech, David had built an impressive career

Maria Fujihara, Sinai Technologies: Helping corporations mitigate climate change through decarbonization software, Ep 139   Maria Fujihara firmly believes in the power of the private sector to be a key piece in combating climate change. After a successful career in Brazil’s Green Building Council, Maria decided that if she was to work in that space again it would be on her own terms.    She fulfilled that desire by founding Sinai Technologies, a decarbonization platform that helps corporations manage their carbon emissions and allocate capital for mitigation efforts. They offer a complete guide to companies on how to navigate across their carbon journey from beginning to end.   I sat down with Maria to talk about what these pathways look like for a big company and why it’s important to transition to a low carbon economy. We also discuss her experience working in the nonprofit sector before entering the entrepreneurial world and Maria offers advice to other entrepreneurs on how to deal with the ecosystem’s gat

Agustin Feuerhake, Fintual: Redefining what it means to invest in Latin America, Ep 138 For retail investors in Latin America, the options to invest are limited. This space is often dominated by traditional banks that charge very high fees and involve processes that are quite complex for non-experts.    As co-founder and CMO of robo advisor Fintual, Agustin Feuerhake intends to change that reality by helping Latin Americans invest well. Fintual is a digital platform that makes investing in mutual funds more accessible through lower fees and simpler processes.   I sat down with Agustin to talk about his endeavors over the years as one of the most prolific entrepreneurs we’ve had on the podcast. He shares with us his reflections on reaching an exit with QueHambre as a young entrepreneur, as well as what it was like to have co-founded the first Chilean company to get into YCombinator. Exiting QueHambre When Agustin and his team were building the food delivery startup QueHambre –a novel concept for Latin America

Jose Miguel Cortes, Fondo de Fondos: Supporting the venture capital industry in Mexico and Latin America, Ep 137   A fund of funds raises capital from different investors to invest in Venture Capital or Private Equity funds. These investors –mostly institutional– pick funds of funds so that they can trust a professional manager to pick the best VC funds to invest in.    Jose Miguel Cortes is the Head of Venture Capital and Impact Investing Strategies for Fondo de Fondos, a leading Mexican private equity and VC fund of funds and co-investment alternative investment management firm.    I sat down with Jose Miguel to talk about what a fund of funds model entails, from their investment criteria to what it’s like raising capital. We also discuss the impact of COVID-19 on the VC market in Mexico and Latin America and the vision behind Fondo de Fondos’ new impact fund. “I have a lot of respect for VCs” Raising capital as an entrepreneur can be challenging, but raising capital as a VC is a lot harder. Jose Miguel und