Brazilian E-Commerce reaches over US$10 Bi in sales

In the last year, most of the investments in the Brazilian startups targeted e-commerce businesses, including investments from some of the most traditional funds in the world, such as Tiger Global, Accel Partners, Intel Capital, RedPoint Ventures, just to mention a few. The numbers of this industry announced last week by e-bit confirms the potential.

According to the report presented by e-bit’s CEO Pedro Guasti, the Brazilian e-commerce reached R$ 18,7 billions (about US$ 10.5 billion) in sales in 2011, a 26% net growth compared to 2010. The emerging middle class represents 61% of the new 9 million e-consumers, that expended R$350 (about US$ 195) on average. Last year, 32 million consumers have bought at least once via web.

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The year just starts after Carnival in Brazil. Really?

Brazilians get used to say that the year just starts for real after Carnival, which can happen in the beginning of February and sometimes March. Last week just proved that if this assumption was real once, something has changed in the entrepreneurial scene. Last Thursday, before Carnival starts, we had several big moves in the market involving two main verticals: restaurant reservation platforms and fashion e-commerce. 

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More than half of the Brazilian students wants to be an entrepreneur: the call, the hype or traditional leadership issues?

Ac couple weeks ago I've posted at Pulsosocial about an Endeavor's research that points out that over 50 percent of the Brazilian students wants to be an entrepreneur.

Besides the skilled workforce blackout that is already a reality in the high tech Brazilian market, those numbers lead us to another important question: is it due the call, the hype or issues with the traditional leadership style? 

An interesting aspect is that among those students, 7.6 percent are already entrepreneurs and most of them have other entrepreneurs in family. When it happens, the confidence of the potential entrepreneurs is lower than the average. It is certainly a symptom of the legal local system that makes the entrepreneurial life much harder than in other countries.

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2011 Brazilian Investments Market and What to Expect for 2012

An overview of the startups investments in the Brazilian market in 2011 and what to expect in 2012 is the subject of my new post at Pulso Social.

Watch it out here!

StartupFarm: a new approach to create and accelerate startups in Brazil

The entrepreneurial scene has been evolving faster and faster in Brazil in the last months. After some editions of Startup Weekend (São Paulo, Campinas, Rio de Janeiro), the 6^th edition of the Brazil/Intel Challenge, the Buscapé Challenge (Your idea is worth 1 million), the recently launched CampinasTECH Meetup – Investments and even more, on the 20^th starts the first edition of StartupFarm.

StartupFarm promises to create and accelerate digital startups in 30 days. The program will gather up to 50 entrepreneurs that will have one month to present and develop their ideas, being supported by experienced mentors. Starting in São Paulo at the co-working space Hub, the following edition will occur in Campinas.

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