The early-stage venture capital fund Manutara Ventures is gearing up to run a program to help Latin American startups establish their presence in the U.S., and it has already completed a key step: selecting the companies that will participate in the initiative.
The firm, originally from Chile but with operations in Miami, announced in a statement that it chose 20 startups for a virtual preparation program aimed at eventually softlanding in Miami, expanding their operations to that market.
Out of the 90 startups that applied, Manutara selected 20, who will now enter an initial virtual workshop. Following this, the venture capital fund will select ten to participate in an elevator pitch event, during which a committee will choose the five winners who will attend the in-person softlanding in Miami. Additionally, they announced, one of these young firms will receive a $500,000 investment.
Of the startups now participating in the workshop, 13 are Chilean companies: Check WMS, Alseco, Dyegon, Forpay, Tufirmadigital, CamiónGO, BntHunter, Flujappi, Ambar Chile, StrikeOne, Ventipay, Wbuild, and Owl Team Solutions. There are also two Colombian firms, Menupp and Autoparti, along with the Mexican Getxerpa, the Argentine Delfi IA, the Brazilian Brota, and the Peruvian Kambia. Only one company in the program is from outside Latin America: Fydels, based in China.
The selection process and the management of the softlanding program are in the hands of Manutara Ventures, which has a startup portfolio valued at over $1 billion. Cambridge Innovation Center Softlanding (CIC Softlanding) is the entity assisting the internationalization process. The initiative also has the support of the Chilean state agency Corfo.
The Applications
“There was a significant increase in applications compared to last year, which makes us very happy, and, just like last year, there were interesting candidates with potential for investment at their current stage. But that will be seen and decided at the end of the program,” said Cristián Olea, Managing Partner of Manutara Ventures, in the press release.
Of the total 90 startups that applied, 37% are from Chile and 36% from other Latin American countries, while 18% declared themselves from European Union countries and the remaining 9% came from startups already based in the United States.
The applicants primarily belong to the B2B sector, but Manutara also reported an increase in applications from fintech and other companies that have AI as an important component in the development of their proposal.
“So far, the results have been positive. On the other hand, it can be seen that the entrepreneurial spirit never dies, and thanks to this call, we managed to identify a lot of startups that we didn’t have on our radar, which are still at stages a bit early for the fund we have open to investments, but that could be candidates for investment in the future,” Olea said.
