Let me tell you about Salvy, the only company from Latin America to make it into this next batch of Y Combinator, perhaps the world’s most prestigious startup accelerator.
Founded out of Curitiba in 2022, Salvy operates as a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO), in essence, a mobile carrier for businesses in Brazil.
Salvy is not Endeavor (yet), but it has a very Endeavor story… And here’s where the multiplier effect story begins:
1️. All the founders had past experience as executives at Endeavor companies.
Maria Eduarda Kumlehn worked for 3 years at Conta Azul, Brazil’s leading provider of cloud accounting software, selected as an Endeavor company in 2017.
She was also the head of data at Pipefy, a business optimization platform serving clients in more than 140 countries and named Endeavor’s fastest-growing startup in 2020.
Lucas Rosa, Hudo Assenço, and Artur Negrão all worked at EBANX, a Brazilian payments company that became a unicorn in 2019 and serves millions of users across Latin America.
You may have heard of the infamous PayPal mafia, where the investors and builders at that company led the creation of LinkedIn, Tesla, Yelp, and YouTube. This is our version!
2️. Their initial pre-seed back in 2022, was made possible by Latitud, co-founded by Endeavor Entrepreneur Brian Requarth.
And their seed investment six months ago was then led by SaaSholic, which was created by Diego Gomes, the CEO of Endeavor company Rock Content, the largest content marketing company in Latin America, producing content for 20 global companies in Portuguese and Spanish.
The fund also comprises investors such as André Fonseca from Dito CRM, plus a handful of executives from RD Station, Rocket.Chat, Pipefy, and Rock Content.
All Endeavor Entrepreneurs!
3️. After forming Salvy, Maria, Lucas, and Artur’s first clients included leading Endeavor companies such as Maria’s former employer Pipefy as well as RD Station, and Beep Saúde.
RD Station is a leading player in Brazil’s digital marketing space, acquired in 2021 in the largest M&A deal in the history of the Brazilian startup tech sector. Beep Saúde, selected by Endeavor in 2020, is Brazil’s leading digital vaccination-on-demand platform, providing in-home healthcare services across more than 150 cities.
Now, that list of clients also features the likes of Netherlands-based Hunter Douglas, Inc., the world’s leading manufacturer of window coverings, Japan-based The Coffee, which operates 189 outlets across five countries, and Brazil’s Wiser Educação, an edtech company present in more than 85 countries.
Now tell me: How would a bustling ecosystem be possible, without the spark that comes from prior entrepreneurs? Ecosystems only thrive thanks to entrepreneurs multiplying their impact. The facts above are proof of a strong Brazilian ecosystem and a sign of much more greatness to come. We here at Endeavor call this the Multiplier Effect (read more here).
Congrats to Artur Negrão, Hudo Assenço, Lucas Rosa, Maria Eduarda Kumlehn, and the whole Salvy (YC W24) team!