REGISTRATION NOW OPEN

LAVCA Tech Brasil

Registration for LAVCA Tech Brasil 2024 is now open. 

The program will include keynote fireside chats, breakout sessions and networking opportunities designed to build meaningful relationships amongst investors active in the region.

LAVCA Members are welcome to join us for a Members-only dinner right after the program. 

LAVCA Tech Brasil 2024 is made possible with support from LAVCA’s Tech Growth Members. Special thanks to Google for hosting, along with AWS, Qualcomm Ventures, MercadoLibre, Riverwood Capital and SVB, for their continued partnership.

Stay tuned for additional details in the coming weeks. Contact Marcelo Pizzato mpizzato@lavca.org with questions.

Deals

▸ Félix Pago, a US and Mexico-based cross-border WhatsApp payments startup, raised a USD15.5m Series A with follow-on from MELI Capital, the CVC arm of Mercado Libre, Switch Ventures, HTwenty and Contour.

▸ DATA | IGNIA Partners and Ulu Ventures co-led a USD15m pre-Series A for Novel, a US-based fundraising data platform for entrepreneurs, with participation from MatterScale and Gaingels.

▸ DEBT | Loopay, a Colombian treasury management platform, raised a USD10m debt round from undisclosed investors. 

▸ AGTECH | ALB Investments led a USD6m pre-Series B for AgroUrbana, a Chilean agtech focused on vertical agriculture.

• Kayyak Ventures led a USD4m Series A in October 2021; CLIN Fund led a ~USD1m round in June 2020.

▸ AGTECH | Psyche Aerospace, a Brazilian agricultural spraying solutions startup, raised a ~USD2.8m Series A from undisclosed investors. 

▸ Verde, a Brazilian lending platform for rural producers, raised a USD2.7m seed round from Y Combinator, Iporanga Ventures and undisclosed investors. 

▸ LOGISTICS | Indicator Capital led a ~USD1.9m round for Infleet, a Brazilian fleet operations management platform, with participation from CV iDexo and follow-on from DOMO. 

• Citrino Ventures led a ~USD1m round in April 2023; DOMO and BossaNova made a ~USD520k investment in June 2022.

▸ HEALTHTECH | Syn Saúde, a Brazilian elective surgeries facilitation platform, raised a USD1.5m round from Osten Moove. 

▸ HEALTHTECH | Cannect, a Brazilian medical cannabis marketplace, raised a ~USD1m round with 4Equity. 

• Supera Capital and BluStone led an undisclosed round in June 2023; Cannect raised a ~USD2m seed round in early 2022. 

▸ EDTECH | CoGrader, a US-based generative AI grading system, raised a ~USD570k pre-seed round from Strive, Maze, ECMC and UC Berkeley. 

• CoGrader was co-founded by Brazilians Gabriel Adamante and Vitor Barbosa.

▸ HRTECH | Consignei, a Brazilian payroll loans platform, raised ~USD566k from Bertha Capital. 

▸ Afya Limited led a ~USD300k pre-seed round for Wanda, a Brazilian nursing recruitment platform. 

▸ InvesTech led ~USD230k seed round for Actiz, a Brazilian quality control services startup, with participation from FUNSES1. 

▸ Bertha Capital invested ~USD200k in BeBook, a Brazil-based hotel revenue management platform.

• Lighthouse invested ~USD300k in August 2023.

▸ Manzana Verde, a Mexico-based digital nutritionist platform, raised an undisclosed seed round from Ganas Ventures, Amplifica Ventures, Salkantay Ventures, Mr. Pink and Matterscale Ventures.

▸ Potato Valley Ventures invested in MoReCo, a Brazilian furniture subscription platform. 

▸ CVC | BYX Ventures, the CVC fund of BYMA, invested in Vor-Tex, a Chilean no-code API platform. 

▸ HONDURAS | Innogen Capital led an undisclosed round for Ginih, a Honduras-based B2B money disbursement platform, with participation from Grupo Agrisal and Grupo Steiner. 

Exits and M&As

▸ M&A | Payment platform PayRetailers acquired Transfeera, a Brazilian open banking payment platform.

• Honey Island Capital and 4UM Investimentos led a ~USD1.4m seed round in January 2023; BossaNova invested in August 2020. 

▸ CROSSBORDER | Chilean payments platform Koywe acquired Facto, a US-based invoicing platform. 

• Koywe raised an undisclosed round in April 2023 from 99 Startups, Bridge Latam, Daedalus Ventures, Manutara Ventures, Rhombuz and YC.

▸ M&A | Evertec, a publicly-listed transaction processing platform, acquired Zunify, a Costa Rica-based e-commerce and POS payment platform.

• Zunify raised a USD1m pre-seed round in May 2022 led by Canadian early-stage investor Loyal VC. Caricaco was also an investor.

Funds

▸ SEED | Semilla Ventures reached a USD9.25m first close for its inaugural fund to invest in pre-seed startups in Spanish-speaking Latin America. 

• Semilla Ventures is led by angel José Vielma. 

▸ Brazilian accelerator Darwin Startups launched an inaugural fund with a ~USD25m target to invest in Brazilian pre-seed and seed-stage startups. 

• Startups accelerated by Darwin Startups include 4MDG, Revpay, CondoConta and Payface.

▸ CROSSBORDER | Brazil-based investor eB Capital partnered with the Minister of Investment of Saudi Arabia (MISA) to foster collaboration between Brazilian and Middle Eastern institutional investors. 

▸ ANGEL | Mexico-based Guadalajara Angel Investor Network (GAIN), launched a USD5m fund to invest in early-stage startups across Latin America. 

News

▸ ELECTIONS | Claudia Sheinbaum won the presidential election in Mexico this Sunday. She will be the first woman president in the country’s 200 years since becoming independent. 

• Sheinbaum’s interest in climate infrastructure and scientific background are seen with good eyes; her party’s supermajority in Congress might yield the President’s office unprecedented influence not so much. 
• The public market was not optimistic about the election outcome.

▸ Bloomberg: Nubank Dethrones Itau to Become the Most Valuable Latin America Bank. 

• Nubank sits at a USD57b market cap as of the publishing of this edition; Itau trades at USD55b. 

▸ CLOUD | Alibaba announced the launch of its first cloud region in Mexico through Alibaba Cloud. 

• This is one of the latest cloud-focused plays from global tech companies – Microsoft recently announced USD4.2b in cloud infrastructure investment across Kenya, Indonesia and the Middle East. 

▸ Argentine president Javier Milei met with big tech CEOs in Silicon Valley as part of his international engagement strategy.

• Meetings included Sundar Pichai, Sam Altman (OpenAI), Mark Zuckerberg (Meta) and Tim Cook (Apple).
• Peter Thiel (Founders Fund) has visited Milei in Buenos Aires twice already this year.

People & Programs

▸ Congrats to Gina Diez Barroso (Grupo Diarq) and Antonio Soares (Dock) for winning EY’s Entrepreneur of the Year Award 2024 for Mexico and Brazil, respectively. 

▸ MARK YOUR CALENDAR | LAVCA will be hosting LAVCA Week on 8-11 October in New York. Registration is now open for LAVCA Members. 

▸ ABVCAP will host the ABVCAP Congress in São Paulo on 11-12 June. More information here. 

▸ LAVCA, Google for Startups and Cubo Itaú will co-host Empower Breakfast on 13 June in São Paulo, a space for leading women in tech. LAVCA and Google for Startups will provide key data and exclusive research on GenAI and investment trends for women-led startups in the region. Registration is now open.

▸ Cubo Network will host VC.Vision: Mastering Fundraising and Liquidity for LatAm, its flagship event to connect GPs and LPs actively deploying capital in venture on 14 June in São Paulo. More details here. 

Global Tech

▸ Sign up for GPCA’s Global Tech Brief, a monthly newsletter that covers tech activity in Asia, Latin America, Africa, CEE and the Middle East. 

LAVCA is now part of GPCA, the Global Private Capital Association, and will continue to operate as a parallel membership organization with its own dedicated team and board.