📧 Did someone forward you this email? Sign up here.

Editor's Note: The LatAm Venture Bulletin is produced by Carlos Ramos de la Vega, LAVCA’s Manager of Venture Capital. Former Editor Julie Ruvolo now publishes our global newsletter, the Global Tech Brief.

TLDR

📢 Call for Nominations: LAVCA nominations for the 2021 Top Women and Emerging Women Investors in Latin American Tech are now open

📢 Nubank files for dual Brazil/NY IPO at an estimated USD50.6b valuation

📢 New Rounds for: Pismo, Pipfy, Hash, Fintual, Justos, Pomelo, Rock Content, Memed, Traive, Ben & Frank, Foodology

📢 Tencent’s activity in Latin America

📢 Sequoia’s first known investment in a Chilean startup

📢 Yummy raised the largest Series A for a Venezuelan startup (USD18m)

CALL FOR NOMINATIONS: WOMEN INVESTORS IN LATIN AMERICA

LAVCA is accepting nominations for our annual lists of Top Women Investors and Emerging Women Investors in Latin American Tech.

ACCESS the nomination form to nominate senior-, mid-, and junior-level female investment professionals deploying capital from a VC fund, and women angel investors committing over USD50k to LatAm tech startups.

PARTICIPATE: Investors supporting gender diversity in the region, as well as women founders in STEM are invited to register for WeXchange 2021 (hosted virtually, on December 1 & 2).

NUBANK

> Nubank filed for a dual IPO on the B3 and NYSE, and expects to raise ~USD3.4b at a reported ~USD50b valuation.

• Nubank plans to simultaneously issue shares to its retail customers through Brazilian Depositary Receipts (BDR) on the B3.
• Berkshire Hathaway led a USD750m Series G+ in June 2021 at a reported USD30b valuation.

> Sequoia will partner with Nubank to invest in Latin American startups, according to Bloomberg.

• Former GIC Vice Chairman Paulo Barbosa will lead Nubank’s VC arm; Sequoia Partner Sonya Huang will lead Sequoia’s activity in the region.

THE BIG DEAL

Tencent just acquired a minority stake in Omie, a Brazilian ERP for SMEs, as an extension to the ~USD116m Series C led by SoftBank in August, with participation from Riverwood Capital.

Omie is Tencent’s sixth investment in Latin America in the past nine months, after co-leading two rounds and participating in another three:

🔥 QuintoAndar (Brazil): Greenoaks and Tencent led a USD120m Series E+ at a reported USD5.1b valuation.

🔥 Ualá (Argentina): SoftBank and Tencent led a USD350m Series D at a reported USD2.45 valuation.

🔥 Cora (Brazil): Greenoaks led a USD116m Series B with participation from Tiger Global and Tencent.

🔥 Nubank (Brazil): Tencent participated in a USD400m Series G in January, led by GIC, Whale Rock and Invesco, as well as a USD750m Series G+ in June, led by Berkshire Hathaway.

DEALS

> Tiger Global led a USD135m Series A for Swap, a Brazilian cloud infrastructure and fintech services provider, with participation from Endeavor and angels Justin Mateen (Tinder) and Rahul Mehta (DST Global), and follow-on from Flourish Ventures, ONEVC and GFC.

• Swap launched a corporate benefits white label platform earlier this year, and raised an undisclosed round from GFC, ONEVC and Flourish Ventures in 2020.
• READ LAVCA’s interview with Co-Founders Douglas Storf and Ury Rappaport.
  

> CVC SoftBank Latin America, Amazon and Accel led a USD108m Series B for Pismo, a Brazilian card issue and digital banking platform for SMEs, with participation from Falabella Ventures, PruVen, B3, and follow-on from Redpoint eventures and Headline.

> SoftBank invested USD50m in a USD75m Series C for Pipefy, a US- and Brazil-based low-code BPO platform, with participation from Steadfast Capital, and follow-on from Redpoint eventures and Insight Partners.

• Insight Partners led a USD45m Series B in July 2019; Pipefy raised a USD16m Series A in 2018.

> QED Investors and KASZEK led a USD40m Series C for Hash, a Brazilian payment services provider for non-financial companies offering banking services, with participation from Endeavor Scale-Up Ventures.

• QED Investors led a USD15m Series A in April; KASZEK and Canary invested ~USD2.6m in 2019.

> Sequoia led a USD39m Series B for Fintual, a Chilean robo-advisor and asset management platform. KASZEK invested USD15m in July; ALLVP, YC and Oskar Hjertsonsson (Cornershop) invested previously.

• This is Sequoia’s first known investment in a Chilean startup according to LAVCA Data. Co-founder Agustin Feuerhake shares how the team was introduced to Sequoia through Paul Graham of YC.

 

> SoftBank acquired an additional 4.5m shares in Banco Inter, a publicly-traded Brazilian digital bank.

• SoftBank first acquired ~USD200m in shares in July 2019.

 

> INSURTECH Justos, a pre-launch Brazilian car insurance platform, raised a ~USD35.8m Series A led by Ribbit Capital, with participation from SoftBank and GGV, and follow-on from KASZEK, BigBets and angels David Velez (Nubank) and Carlos Garcia (Kavak).

• KASZEK led a USD2.8m seed round in May.

>  Tiger Global led a USD35m Series A for Pomelo, an Argentine payments infrastructure platform for fintechs launching prepaid cards and credit cards, with participation from monashees, Insight Partners, Index Ventures, SciFi, QED Investors, BoxGroup, Greyhound, Gilgamesh Ventures and Clocktower.

• Sequoia invested USD1m in a seed extension in July; monashees and Index Ventures led the USD9m seed round in May.

> Unbox Capital led a USD30m Series B for Rock Content, a Brazilian content marketing platform, with participation from BTG Pactual and Crescera Capital.

• Igah Ventures (formerly e.Bricks Ventures) led a USD6m round in 2015.

> HEALTHTECH Memed, a Brazilian provider of digital drug prescriptions, raised a ~USD20m round extension led by DNA Capital, Temasek and Fit Participações. DNA Capital led a ~USD60m round in July through a dedicated vehicle for the transaction with capital from undisclosed family offices and sovereign wealth funds.

• EXIT Qualcomm Ventures, Redpoint eventures and monashees exited Memed through a secondary sale to DNA Capital in May.

 

> LOGISTICS Skydropx, a Mexican shipping and delivery management platform for e-commerce brands, raised a USD20m Series A from Cometa, Base10 Partners, and NY-based VC 645 Ventures.

> VENEZUELA US growth equity fund Anthos Capital led a USD18m Series A for Yummy, a San Francisco-based ridesharing and food delivery app with operations in Venezuela, with participation from JAM Fund, the VC fund of Tinder founder Justin Mateen.

• This is the largest known Series A investment for a Venezuelan startup according to LAVCA Data.
• This follows a USD4m round from YC, Canary, Hustle Fund and Necessary Ventures in July.

> AGTECH SP Ventures and Astella Investimentos led a USD17m Series A for Traive, a Brazilian lending platform for agricultural producers.

• Minerva Food invested USD3m in September; Traive raised ~USD2.8m led by SP Ventures, Bread & Butter Ventures and Techstars in November 2020.

> L Catterton led an undisclosed investment for Ben & Frank, a Mexican D2C eyewear brand, with follow-on from Dila Capital.

• Dila and Wollef (formerly Jaguar Ventures) invested in February 2018.

> FOODTECH Andreessen Horowitz and Base Partners led a USD15m Series A for Foodology, a Colombian dark kitchen operator, with follow-on from Kayyak Ventures and Wollef (formerly Jaguar Ventures).

• Angels in the round included Nilam Genenthiran (Instagram), Carlos Garcia (Kavak), Pierpaolo Barbieri (Ualá), Sujay Tyle (Merama) and Dick Boyce (Burger King).
• Wollef invested in August 2020.
• READ LAVCA’s interview with co-founder Daniela Izquierdo.

> Flourish Ventures and GFC led a USD10m Series A for Merce do Bairro, a Brazilian same-day delivery wholesale marketplace for SMEs, with follow-on from DOMO Invest, Alexia Ventures, Prana Capital, MAYA Capital, SV Latam, Quartz and Picus Capital.

• Merce do Bairro was founded by iFood co-founder Guilherme Bonifacio and Zé Delivery co-founder Diego Libanio.

> KASZEK led a USD8m round for Gringo, a Brazilian car documentation management platform, with participation from GFC and ONEVC.

> DEBT ProCredito, a Mexican lending platform for SMEs, secured a USD6m private credit facility from Blue Earth Capital (formerly PG Impact Investments), a Swiss impact investment fund.

> Inventa, a Brazilian marketplace connecting regional wholesalers with local retailers, raised a ~USD6m seed round from NXTP, PearVC, ONEVC and MAYA Capital.

• Inventa was co-founded by Rappi’s Global Director for Grocery Delivery Marcos Salama: “I was global director of Rappi´s grocery vertical from 2017 to 2020. I had the chance to work with thousands of retailers across Latin America. All our retailers had two things in common - they had trouble defining the appropriate inventory assortment, and reducing their working capital spend. The main reason retailers go bankrupt is that they either can’t sell the products they have on their shelves or they misinvest their funds in CapEx and equipment they don’t really need. If I could solve the assortment problem by implementing data-driven recommendations, I could offer them financing at a much lower risk.”
• Inventa is onboarding 1k retailers a week, according to Salama.
  

> PROPTECH Astella Investimentos led a ~USD5m round for Homelend, a Brazilian real estate financing platform with participation from Brazilian investment firm Jera Capital.

> CVC Awto, a Chilean car rental subscription platform, raised USD6m from Kaufmann Ventures, Zurich AGF, Empresas Indumotora and Chile Ventures.

> 500 Global’s Mexico-based fund Somos Lucha invested USD60k in each of the ten startups selected to participate in Batch 14 of its LatAm growth program.

• Participants include Bendo, Bitacora.io, MisFans and Wisepath (Mexico), Bonum Coaching (Miami), Picker (Ecuador), Sioma (Colombia), and Mujer Financiera, Wombo Academy and Worknmates (Argentina).
• 500 just held a USD17m final close for 500 Luchadores III run by Santiago Zavala.

> SECURITY MAYA Capital led a ~USD3.6m seed round for Tenchi Security, a Brazilian cloud computing security platform, with participation from GFC, Kinea and ONEVC.

• Tenchi’s clients include XP Investimentos, BTG Pactual, B3 and Telefónica.

> IOT Indicator Capital and TM3 Capital invested ~USD3m in InfoPrice, a Brazilian developer of hardware-based solutions for foot traffic monitoring and dynamic price setting for small retailers.

> HRTECH Angel Ventures invested USD2.4m in Vinco, a Mexican employee benefits platform focused on employee upskilling, with participation from Alter Global and Reach Capital.

> Wareclouds, a Chilean storage management platform for SMEs, raised USD1.2m from CLIN Fund, Plug and Play Ventures and others.

> Moneypool, a Mexican peer-to-peer payments platform, raised USD1.2m from Goodwater Capital, Angel Hub and Ferted.

> Bossa Nova Investimentos, Anjos do Brasil and others invested ~USD460k in HubLocal, a Brazilian SEO consultancy for SMEs.

• Anjos do Brasil invested ~USD120k in September 2020.

 

> Magma Partners led an undisclosed seed round for Círculo de Belleza, a Mexican product supplier for beauty salons, with participation from 500 Global.

• Circulo de Belleza participated in 500’s Batch 12 in 2020.

 

> Parceiro Ventures invested in netLex, a Brazilian company document and workflow management platform.

• netLex’s clients include Ambev, Ipiranga, Raízen and ArcelorMittal.

M&A

> Brazilian stock exchange B3 acquired Neoway, a Brazilian market intelligence software provider, for ~USD360m in cash.

• Neoway raised USD75m from Temasek and QMS Capital in 2017. Previous investors include monashees, Accel and Endeavor Global.
• In February 2019, Neoway acquired Sevennoa, a digital campaign customization platform, for USD15m.

> PROPTECH Brazilian proptech Loft acquired TrueHome, a Mexican residential real estate platform, and launched operations in Mexico.

• monashees and Class5 Global led a USD8.8m round in TrueHome in March 2020.
• Loft acquired CredPago, a Brazilian fintech enabling residential rentals without collateral, in July after raising a USD100m Series D+ led by Baillie Gifford in April at a reported USD2.9b valuation.

> Brazilian fintech EBANX acquired Juno, a Brazilian billing and payment management platform for e-commerce brands.

> olist, a Brazilian e-commerce platform, acquired Tiny, a Brazilian ERP for SMEs, and Vinda, a Brazilian D2C e-commerce platform.

• Goldman Sachs Asset Management led a USD23m Series D+ for olist in April 2021 and SoftBank Latin America led the ~USD62m Series D in 2020.
• READ LAVCA’s interview with olist Founder and CEO Tiago Dalvi.

 

> HRTECH Gupy, a Brazilian recruiting platform, acquired Niduu, a Brazilian corporate education platform.

• Gupy raised ~USD8m led by Oria Capital in May 2020 and ~USD2.3m led by Valor Capital Group in 2019.

> VidMob, a NY-based video content creation platform, acquired Chiligum, a Brazilian video production automation platform.

• GV Angels and BR Angels invested ~USD400k in Chiligum in July 2020.

FUNDS

> Mexican VC Jaguar Ventures rebranded to Wollef and launched its third fund with a USD100m target.

• General Partners Cristóbal Perdomo and Eric Perez-Grovas share the story behind their rebrand in We've shed our fur but we didn't change our spots.
• Jaguar Ventures’ portfolio includes unicorns Nubank, Kavak, Konfío and Loft.
  

 

> Honey Island Capital, a seed investment firm run by EBANX founders, and 4UM Investimentos, a Brazilian wealth management firm, announced a ~USD20m fund targeting investments in early-stage B2B and fintech startups raising pre-seed to Series B financing.

> Revolut held a ~USD14m first close for its fund with a ~USD40m target to invest in Brazilian fintech startups.

• Revolut’s LPs include MFO Mercury Gestão, Jorge Paulo Lemann (3G Capital), João Paulo Diniz (da Componente), Marcelo Lacerda (Terra) and Guilherme Weege (Malwee).

> Paul Bragiel, former founder of Southeast Asia-focused Golden Gate Ventures and VR-focused Presence Capital, launched Niu Ventures, a USD10m seed fund focused on early-stage startups in Brazil.

• Niu Ventures’ portfolio includes Coodesh, Data Ocean, Condofy and Plipag.

NEWS

> Facebook rebranded to Meta and announced its next chapter as a metaverse-first company.

• Starting Q4 2021, Meta will report operating results for two segments under the holding company: Family of Apps and Reality Labs. Meta is expected to begin trading in the public markets under the ticker MVRS on December 1.

> Brazilian e-commerce platform VTEX partnered with US-based payments platform Stripe to enable cross-border payments for global merchants operating in Mexico and Brazil.

• VTEX listed on the NYSE earlier this year at a USD3.5b+ valuation.

> Clara, a Mexican startup offering corporate expense management for Mexico-based startups, partnered with Mastercard to expand its product offering with corporate credit cards.

• Clara raised a USD5m Series A+ in 2021; General Catalyst and DST Global led the USD30m Series A in June.

> Reuters features DLocal in Tech stampede as investors hunt Latin American unicorns.

> VICE reviews the pace of VC/Tech investing globally in The Great Competition to Give Away Money.

• Frank Rotman of QED Investors: “Because of the broader shifting financial dynamics, founders also have a lot more leverage in the system than they've ever had.”

> POLICY Argentine's Secretary for Internal Trade fixed the price of 1,432 products until January in an attempt to curb rising inflation ahead of midterm elections this month.

> CyberLabs Group, a Brazilian cybersecurity platform, developed an algorithm capable of diagnosing C19 infections through voice and cough sound clips.

GLOBAL TECH

SIGN UP for GPCA’s Global Tech Brief. Edited by LAVCA’s Julie Ruvolo, this bi-weekly newsletter covers tech activity in Asia, Latin America, Africa, CEE and the Middle East.

PEOPLE & PROGRAMS

> Congratulations to BIVA CEO Maria Ariza and Grupo Diarcq’s CEO Gina Diez Barroso for inclusion in Forbes’ Top 20 CEO Change Makers list.

> WOMENLED Uber appointed former Operations Manager Silvia Penna as Brazil Country Head.

> SVB is looking for a Vice President to join their Latin America-focused practice based out of San Francisco. Interested candidates are welcome to apply.

> KASZEK is looking for a Principal to join their investment team based out of São Paulo. Interested candidates are welcome to apply.

> Capria Ventures is looking for a Global Investment Fellow to join its Latin America investing team and work alongside Susana Garcia Robles in deals in the Global South. Interested candidates are welcome to apply.

> Andreessen Horowitz is looking for a Fintech EIR. The selected operator will receive compensation in the form of funding for their venture. Interested candidates are welcome to apply.

THE FUTURE 

> AGTECH Brazil became the first country to approve Bovaer, a feed additive developed through 45 trials over ten years that reduces methane emissions from cattle by as much as 55% by inhibiting the production of methane during digestion.

• Kieran Gartlan of The Yield Lab: “The tech is there, but the farmers’ mindset is not there yet... It will get there quickly because the market is demanding it. For access to European markets there will need to be traceability. Farmers in the red don’t care about being green. If you are financially stable and secure, then the next step is to farm responsibly.”

> CRYPTO Bloomberg: Argentina aims for First Crypto Futures in Latin America.

The LatAm Venture Bulletin is the VC/tech newsletter and content platform of
The Association for Private Capital Investment in Latin America.

Have news we should include? Please email news@lavca.org.