Inspired by so many amazing & strong LATINA Entrepreneurs

I was invited to be a BID Fellow from Colombia to attend WeXchange. An annual gathering of female entrepreneurs in Latin America. At first I didn’t know if I should attend, it felt like loosing focus from my #1 priority, CUSTOMERS. The agenda looked promising and the event was in Paraguay. I had never been to Asunción. And one of my friends from Stanford, Jazmin Gustale, is there and was a speaker at the event; therefore I decided to go. The decision was worth it. The key takeaways for me were the amazing women I met or re-connected with during the event. For that reason, I decided to showcase 5 of those women and how they have inspired me in this entrepreneurship journey:

JAZMIN GUSTALE: She was one of the first people I met at Stanford. Jazmin graduated in the MSx class before mine, was my guide during those initial days and I even kept her bike ;). Today Jazmin leads the innovation strategy of the Paraguayan government. I am inspired by her tenacity and drive to make her country a better place trough innovation. You can say she is an intra-preneur within the Paraguayan government. A challenging task in the public sector that she navigates with leadership, resilience and focus.

ANA BARRERA: Ana is the CEO and founder of Aflore. A company that uses a direct sales model, typical of the beauty industry, to reach the mass market with financial services including micro-credit and insurance. I met Ana last year at Polymath Ventures and she has become a role model for me ever since. I admire her resilience and passion for Aflore. Our paths have also been similar. She became an entrepreneur after many years in the corporate world, in her case, in finance. And she leverages that great experience and at the same time is open to learning how to succeed in a startup.

ANA VICTORIA RICAURTE: Vicky was the Colombian representative at the Pitch Competition and she did an amazing job. She WON! But with or without winning, her startup Arukay is inspiring. She is building a scalable learning system to teach kids how to code at a reasonable costs and effort to the schools. Vicky’s journey is an inspiration and an example to other women entrepreneurs. I encourage you to read more about her and Arukay.

PATRICIA SAENZ: She is one of the rare Latinas managing her own VC fund, EWA Capital, in Latam. A straight forward, tell it like it is, strong woman. I greatly appreciated her candid feedback. It is amazing when an investor tells you straight and in black and white what to improve. She did that with me, and for that I am a better entrepreneur today. In addition, I never thought of investors as peer entrepreneurs. And listening to Patricia and her fellow investors at WeXchange helped me see that side of the VC investor world.

THE WEXCHANGE COMMUNITY: For the last one I couldn’t pick just one. Therefore I decided to highlight the whole group. In general I saw women who are leaders, strong, resilient, passionate and most of all… human. And what I mean by human is that they are all down to earth, daughters, sisters, wives, mothers… All conscious of their role to make our society a better one. Also aware of the immense and positive impact entrepreneurship can have on our economies. And that is why we were all there. Confident that our efforts to build great companies can have a great impact in our communities. And that I admire and respect about each and every woman present at WeXchange!

Finally I want to thank the BID, or IDB in English, for giving me the push I needed to make the decision to attend the conference. I am inspired, humbled and energized to continue this journey to make KAPUA a great global company!

NOTE: My last photo of a great trip!