🏦 Issue #63: The Banking Backbone For U.S. Latinos
Claremont alumnus Robbie Figueroa shares more about his company Maza, the first neobank for U.S. Latinos backed by a16z
💬 Welcome to issue #63 of Between the Lines
Good morning & happy Thursday. Let’s face it; traditional banks can be archaic, slow-moving, and leave a bit to be desired. Unsurprisingly, there has been a seismic consumer behavior change toward neobanking services, with a 2022 estimated $66B+ market size expected to grow to $2 trillion in 2030.
Despite the proliferation of neobanks in the U.S. over the past few years, however, there has been little banking development curated for Hispanics and Latinos. Robbie Figueroa shares how he is tackling this left-out yet fast-growing demographic.
~ Josh & Miles
👤 Community Spotlight: Robbie Figueroa
Robbie grew up in Queens and wanted to escape the cold as soon as possible, which is part of what led him to Claremont. Being the son of Latino immigrants also influenced his career trajectory, as his first job post-grad was in an accelerator in Latin America called Endeavor. He then worked in late-stage PE at Pantheon, followed by two years in DoorDash’s Growth Strategy Team, and most recently as GM of DoorDash Puerto Rico and the Caribbean. He is currently the co-founder and COO of Maza — the first neobank for US Latinos backed by a16z.
What’s the problem you’re solving now? Tell us more about Maza.
Latinos are the fastest-growing demographic in the US, but the banking experience still is not curated for this audience, particularly for the underbanked and the unbanked. Maza is building the banking backbone for Hispanics in the US, starting with an online checking and savings account.
I started the company with my co-founder from the startup studio, who is also Latino and a YC alum, after realizing we wanted to continue building in consumer, but with higher impact and within a demographic we know intimately. We’re still technically in stealth (announcement coming end of this Summer!), having raised our seed round last year led by one of the top VCs + other great partners. Fortunately, we’re growing rapidly and are grateful to see so many folks trust us with their money and spend with our debit cards. We’re currently scaling our channels and hiring specifically for my team, so if you know of any talented growth marketers or skilled ops candidates, please let us know.
Fun fact, there are currently two other Claremont alums working at Maza with me (Elliot Godzich and Jocelyn Livier).
After spending multiple years in Latin America working with startups in Brazil, Puerto Rico, and other countries, what has you the most excited about the LATAM and Hispanic market and startup scene?
It’s exciting to see LatAm as no longer just opportunistic for investors (as it was ~4 years ago) but rather a dedicated strategy, given the proliferation of startups post-unicorn stage like Rappi. Founders are also getting younger. Before, the cultural paradigm was that entrepreneurship was only “okay” for seasoned professionals with a cash cushion. But, local success stories have made entrepreneurship much more “cool” and raised the risk appetite of younger millennials to start their own thing (much like SV, LatAm and other emerging markets are just a few years behind). However, the most significant gap in this ecosystem continues to be at the seed stage, as many local investors are comparatively risk-averse and historically have taken positions at later stages of a company. This leaves many LatAm founders seeking US capital or accelerators.👇
🚨Claremonster Call-Out: Ben Kovler
Ben Kovler is a Claremont graduate and the founder and CEO of Green Thumb Industries. Ben founded GTI in 2014 and has successfully grown it into a national cannabis consumer packaged goods company that also owns and operates the rapidly growing national retail cannabis stores called RISE. Headquartered in Chicago, GTI has 13 manufacturing facilities, licenses for 96 retail locations, and operations across 12 U.S. markets, employing roughly 1,300 people.
After raising a few small financings rounds from venture investors in 2014 and 2016, Ben and Team took the company public in 2018, IPOing with a valuation of over $850M. After four years, the company now has a market cap of over $2.3B. Ben was also recently recognized as the Most Impactful Cannabis Executive.
💼 Who’s Hiring?:
WorkPatterns is a people management app that gives managers tools for unlocking the potential of their teams. They guide workplace relationships with a framework for better 1:1s, AI-assisted feedback, and simplified goal setting. Co-founded by Claremont graduates Noah Duncan and Dmitri Skjorshammer, WorkPatterns has over 300 paying customers, including teams at Apple, Nike, Panasonic, Peloton, and many more.
WorkPatterns recently raised a $4.2M round of funding, led by Javelin Venture Partners, Founders Fund, Zoom, and Merus Capital. Check out their openings below to learn more about their team:
Rockerbox, founded by Claremont alumnus Patrick O’Toole, builds technology that enables companies to grow faster and more efficiently. They work with leading DTC and eCommerce brands to accurately measure the impact of their marketing activities by combining paid, organic, digital, and offline attributions into a single SaaS platform. Earlier this year, Rockerbox was named a 2022 Best Workplace by Inc Magazine, and they’re currently hiring for a Product Specialist and several other positions:
Check out the other ~5,000 open jobs at 400+ Claremont-affiliated companies here on our Storyboard. Plus, create a profile and enter your preferences to get alerted to new job postings relevant to you, be they the 1,000+ remote jobs, 100+ internships, or 40+ part-time positions available. We’ve published research that shows that Claremont-founded companies that disproportionately hire Claremont talent outperform — so pay attention, Claremonsters!
If any of these roles catch your eye 👀 , apply and mention Between the Lines. Or, if you are an employer looking to hire tip-top Claremont talent, fill out this form to have your jobs featured.
🗣️ Conversations on the Interwebz:
This week’s must-watch 📺
Claremont graduate Locke Brown is the CEO and founder of NuID, a trustless authentication API and decentralized identity solution for websites and applications. He shares why he believes the future of the internet belongs to the user and how NuID’s decentralized identity architecture was designed to support that future.
Everything else you need to know💡
Leah Wald is a Claremont alumnus and the CEO of Valkyrie Investments — a specialized alternative asset management firm at the intersection of traditional finance and the emerging crypto sector.
After graduating from Claremont, Bobby Tzekin had a decade-plus-long career in product roles at startups and PayPal before founding Wisetack. Wisetack brings ‘buy now, pay later’ to in-person services and embeds financing options into software platforms that businesses have already built. Last year they raised a $45M Series B led by Insight Partners and Greylock.
Claremont graduate Erikan Obotetukudo was recognized as one of the most influential women in web3. She’s been investing in Africa and emerging markets for the last two years and is the founder and managing partner of crypto VC fund Audacity.
Can’t get enough of Between the Lines? Follow and connect with us on Twitter!
🍽️ BTL Snacks:
🧬 Starting a Revolution Isn’t Enough….. CRISPR is changing the world, but according to Claremont alumnus Jennifer Doudna, it can do more. Doudna is a Nobel Prize-winner, co-inventor of CRISPR gene-editing technology, and a serial entrepreneur and founder of biotech companies like Mammoth Biosciences and Scribe Therapeutics. She shares some of her exciting ideas on the future that CRISPR will help build.
👶 Child Care In The Digital Age….. Claremont graduate Shadiah Sigala co-founded Kinside, a platform that helps working parents find and pay for child care. Since launching in 2020, Kinside serves more than 4,000 employers and their employees, who get access to a database of available child care providers and a tech-forward way to pay for it, using dependent FSA dollars and other employer-provided stipends. They also raised a $12M Series A this summer.
🦄 15 Potential Unicorn Failures….. In recent years, investors have rained cash on Uber, Airbnb, and other unprofitable companies. Claremont graduate and Professor Gary Smith discusses the 15 biggest money-losing startups in the U.S. that have raised $93.8B and lost $135.1B. Most of these unicorn startups have seen their share prices fall more than 50% in the past year, and many of these stocks are down more than 90%
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