A decade ago Argentina was at the forefront of Latin America’s internet bubble, and its entrepreneurs and start-up companies were making inroads into international markets with high-profile IPOs on the Nasdaq exchange. Today the country is successfully positioning itself as a global player in IT-related industries including software development, business process outsourcing, internet businesses (social networks, semantics web, marketplaces, etc.) and video games and online social gaming. Read more
A series of mostly unrelated activities brought LAVCA to Chile in early December, just days before the country was accepted into the OECD on December 15. Beginning with a presentation at the OECD Corporate Governance Roundtable in Santiago and ending at an ‘asado’ with IT entrepreneurs and investors at the estate of Wenceslao Casares in Pirque, my colleague Ariel Muslera and I were busy all week.
Early stage and venture capital investing is expanding in Latin America, with cities such as Florianopolis and Buenos Aires acting as hubs of venture activity in the region’s southern cone of Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Uruguay. But an incipient VC industry is also emerging much farther north in Mexico, despite the inherent challenges the country has traditionally presented for entrepreneurs. Over the last 18 months, a combination of change drivers have contributed to an improved ecosystem for entrepreneurs, angels investors and venture capital fund managers aiming to generate new businesses in Mexico.
Over 200 participants crowded into the ballroom at the University Club on September 21-22 for LAVCA’s 2009 Summit and Investor Roundtable – and a surprisingly large number of those in attendance were institutional investors sizing up the Latin America PE market with an eye to 2010 and beyond. U.S. and Canadian investors were represented by a cross section of endowments, foundations and public and private pension funds, while the appearance of the first Japanese LPs to attend a LAVCA gathering captured attention.
One of the key issues affecting the development of private equity and venture capital investment in Latin America is the availability of capital from local pension funds – private capital firms in Brazil, Colombia and Peru have succeeded in raising new funds in 2009 even as institutional investors in the US and Europe have remained on the sidelines.
