Twelve Fintech Startups Selected for Village Capital’s Finance Forward Latin America 2020 Accelerator

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July 23, 2020 (Mexico City, MX) —Village Capital, with the support of MetLife Foundation, PayPal, and Moody’s, today announced the twelve early-stage fintech startups selected to take part in Finance Forward Latin America 2020. An accelerator, Finance Forward Latin America 2020 will provide the startups with five weeks of training focused on improving their business models and making their solutions available to those who need them most in the current economic climate.

Each startup selected for the accelerator will work closely with mentors, potential clients and partners, as well as investors they need to scale their impact, using tools developed to help their self-evaluation, such as Village Capital’s Abaca. The top two peer-selected companies will be eligible to receive $50K USD each in grant funding from MetLife Foundation, while the third to fifth best-ranked startups will receive $16K USD in grant funding from MetLife Foundation, to support their operations during these trying times.

“The coronavirus pandemic has had devastating financial effects on low-income populations in Latin America. Now more than ever, tech-driven innovation can be at the forefront of helping small businesses stay afloat, families manage their income, and the region embark on what is bound to be a challenging recovery,” said Daniel Cossío, Regional Manager for Village Capital Latin America. “We are excited to support these twelve startups that have innovative solutions to some of the region’s most important challenges in five different countries.”

Finance Forward Latin America 2020 is a part of a multi-year global coalition led by founding partners MetLife Foundation and PayPal, with regional support from Moody’s, to support entrepreneurs building tech-enabled solutions to challenges around financial health. 

More than 140 entrepreneurs from 11 countries in Latin America applied to be a part of the accelerator. The final cohort is composed of the top twelve companies from five different countries (Colombia, Mexico, Chile, Brazil, and Argentina). Over 80% of companies selected have one or more female founders, while over 40% are working from outside major fintech hubs in four different financial health sectors; Financial Management, Alternative Finance, E-commerce, and Payments. 

Here are the twelve startups in the cohort that are improving financial health in Latin America:

1. Akredito (Brazil) pays, consolidates, and refinances all debts of a defaulter whose registration at credit bureaus prevents him/her from getting a job, requesting another credit, and more.
2. Aplazo (Mexico) allows consumers in Mexico to split e-commerce purchases in equal biweekly installments without needing a credit card and avoiding the debt trap.
3. CIGE Mexico (Mexico) offers an AI solution that guarantees entrepreneurs advisory to manage their business, as 80% of the SMEs in Latin America go into bankruptcy within the first two years of operations.
4. Creci (Colombia) furthers financial inclusion and social impact goals by providing credit facilities to MSMEs that are promoting at least one of the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals. Through a simple and easy-to-use online tool, Creci helps its clients identify and report their impact, with the goal of capturing and profiling impact statistics across its portfolio to better attract capital resources for SMEs furthering social impact.
5. Corresponsales Digitales Imix (Colombia) enables small local businesses to become a banking correspondent, by turning the business owners into banking services providers and allowing financial institutions to have a wider reach at a lower cost.
6. DRUBER / ZIZU (Argentina) is a card-to-card remittance service for Argentinian families that allows them to control the remittances issued in other countries, and to give families the security of an income, using the least amount of cash transactions possible.
7. Factcil (Colombia) seeks to provide liquidity with factoring services to all those self employed or freelancers. Because of the lack of job stability in people’s profiles, it is often difficult to find entities that can give them the needed resources to be financially healthy.
8. Finerio (Mexico) helps fintechs, banks, and financial institutions update their services and process their data into useful insights for catalysing their clients financial wellbeing.
9. Fundefir (Colombia) gives the opportunity for unbanked individuals to access credits, insurance and other wellbeing services. Its goal is to promote financial services in segments that are used to instruments such as ROSCAs (Rotating Saving and Credit Associations) and to provide a benefit on its digitization.
10. Nilus (Argentina) rescues healthy food that would otherwise be thrown away and delivers it to low income neighbors, at discounted prices. 
11. Quipu Market (Colombia) is an e-commerce marketplace for informal microbusinesses to buy and sell locally without cash and using a community token system.
12. U-Zave (Chile) helps Latin America save for the future (as 56% of them do not do so), through a platform where a percentage of every purchase they make is collected within a mutual fund.

For more information, reach out to Sofía Cándano at Village Capital (sofia.candano@vilcap.com).

About Village Capital

Village Capital helps entrepreneurs bring big ideas from vision to scale. Our mission is to reinvent the system to back the entrepreneurs of the future. Our vision is a future where business creates equity and long-term prosperity. Since 2009, we have supported more than 1,000 early-stage entrepreneurs through our accelerator programs. Our affiliated fund, VilCap Investments, has invested in more than 100 program graduates, including 9 early-stage Latin American companies like Fintual, ePesos and Mutuo Financiera.

About MetLife Foundation

At MetLife Foundation, we believe financial health belongs to everyone. We bring together bold solutions, deep financial expertise and meaningful grants to build financial health for people and communities that are underserved and aspire for more. We partner with organizations around the world to create financial health solutions and build stronger communities, engaging MetLife employee volunteers to help drive impact. MetLife Foundation was created in 1976 to continue MetLife’s long tradition of corporate contributions and community involvement. Since its founding through the end of 2019, MetLife Foundation provided more than $860 million in grants and $85 million in program-related investments to make a positive impact in the communities where MetLife operates. To date, our financial health work has reached 9.9 million low-income individuals in 42 countries. To learn more about MetLife Foundation, visit metlife.org.

About PayPal

PayPal has remained at the forefront of the digital payment revolution for more than 20 years. By leveraging technology to make financial services and commerce more convenient, affordable, and secure, the PayPal platform is empowering more than 300 million consumers and merchants in more than 200 markets to join and thrive in the global economy. For more information, visit paypal.com.

About Moody’s

Moody’s (NYSE:MCO) is a global integrated risk assessment firm that empowers organizations to make better decisions. Our data, analytical solutions and insights help decision-makers identify opportunities and manage the risks of doing business with others. We believe that greater transparency, more informed decisions, and fair access to information open the door to shared progress. With over 11,300 employees in more than 40 countries, Moody’s combines international presence with local expertise and over a century of experience in financial markets. Learn more at moodys.com/about.

Moody’s builds toward a world where more people have access to opportunity, and where everyone has what they need to grow and thrive. We are committed to opening the door to brighter futures through our global corporate social responsibility programs connecting people around the world with the knowledge and resources they need to succeed. For more information visit moodys.com/csr.