Visa Everywhere Initiative looks for allies in startups in Latin America

These 10 fintech startups will compete for US$25,000 and the opportunity to collaborate with the Visa Everywhere Initiative for Latin America.

Visa Everywhere Initiative looks for allies in startups in Latin America
These emerging companies were finalists in the Visa Everywhere Initiative, organized in partnership with Finnovista. Image: Visa

Visa Everywhere Initiative and Finnovista are looking for Latin American and Caribbean startups that, through their financial technology solutions (fintech), will help reactivate local economies. 99% of the companies in the region are SMEs and account for 61% of formal employment.

Another important pillar as the region moves forward in reopening cities is the ability to provide safe and friction-free payment experiences in public transportation or other urban mobility systems, which are vital to Latin American cities. These two important societal challenges were addressed in this edition of the Visa Everywhere Initiative for Latin America and the Caribbean.

After more than 300 applications were received, 30 startups were selected to compete virtually in the semi-finals of this acceleration competition. Of these semi-finals, 10 finalists were selected to participate in a virtual immersion program designed to accelerate collaboration with Visa.

Lendera (Mexico)

A crowdfunding platform to invest in business projects in exchange for profits. Lendera's clients are small and medium-sized companies with needs for leasing machinery and equipment for their business. Investors can buy a good and rent it to an SME for a determined period so that their money generates returns while the SME acquires the assets and becomes more competitive in the market.

Yaydoo (Mexico)

Smart Business Purchases, Yaydoo helps companies to reduce their business expenses by optimizing each purchase. Yaydoo is creating a suite of products at the intersection of SaaS and Fintech designed to make B2B digital payments a simpler experience in LatAm through procurement and accounts payable automation, accounts receivable automation, corporate purchasing cards, and T&E automation.

FT Technologies (Costa Rica)

"Tap On Phone" solution with Onboarding Digital. FT Technologies' white label solution can give access to the payment card industry to many small and medium companies with a low-cost terminal.

Fygaro (Panama)

eCommerce generator with billing platform. Fygaro is like an ERP (enterprise resource planning system) for micro-SMEs with accounting. The accounting and eCommerce generation have ready-to-use features such as web stores and payment buttons. It provides ease and automation through the sales funnel at an affordable price for MSMEs.

Quipu Market (Colombia)

A platform that creates community digital markets that make the supply of local products and services visible and facilitate trade without money. Quipu's platform is a digital marketplace for informal micro-enterprises where they can buy and sell locally using a system of community tokens instead of money. Their interactions in the marketplace increase creditworthiness.

Riqra (Peru)

Comprehensive eCommerce platform for manufacturers and distributors Riqra's platform allows companies to manage products, promotions, inventory, warehouses, pricing, logistics, customers, credit lines, and taxes.

Datarisk (Brazil)

A " Decision as a Service " platform that allows the generation of predictive models in an automated way. Its solutions based on data science help companies to easily integrate predictive and automatic learning models about revenue and fraud prevention. Although their target customers are usually large companies, they want to develop a better relationship with smaller companies that would also benefit from this solution.

mGrana (Brazil)

Mobile instant credit app that rates its users through data generated by their smartphones. mGrana is solving a key issue for microentrepreneurs, many of whom are not part of the formal economy, by improving their access to loans and allowing them to grow or improve their business. The main element that differentiates mGrana is that its solution helps the unbanked, since currently in Brazil almost 33% of Brazilians do not have access to credit.

Duemint (Chile)

Duemint is solving a key issue shared by most small businesses - liquidity. Its SaaS platform currently automates the collection process for SMEs, settlements with banks, and payment methods. They identified these weaknesses at the heart of small businesses and want to focus on them, on the potentially growing new business lines that are organically derived from these solutions, such as installment solutions or bill lending, while always keeping improved liquidity as a primary objective.

Prometeo (Uruguay)

The largest platform of banking APIs connecting Latin American Financial Institutions. Although its main clients are large financial players such as banks, Prometeo's solution allows small businesses to receive streamlined and digital services that include payment solutions, improved business financial management, and better loans. Prometeo has the potential to be a key link for Fintechs and financial institutions to improve their services, ultimately helping small businesses throughout the region.

On October 15, the 10 finalists who will present their solutions can be seen at the Visa Everywhere Initiative LAC 2020 virtual showcase, organized in partnership with Finnovista. The event will be broadcast live to the entire Fintech community in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The winner of the 2020 edition will receive a prize of US$25,000, the second-place winner US$15,000, and the third runner-up a total of US$10,000. In addition, Visa will be able to evaluate different ways of collaboration with the final startups, such as the development of pilot programs or proof of concept (PoC), mentoring opportunities, and more.