Fondeadora

Norman M ller and Ren Serrano, cofounders of Fondeadora, a Mexican "neobank," had lined up a $12.5 million in Series A funding round in 2020 only to run into a major obstacle: The lead investor was Gradient Ventures, a venture firm launched by Alphabet, Inc., and Mexican banking law would require personal financial disclosures from Alphabet's biggest owners, including Google's founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin. That would be a non-starter with them. To stay under a 5% ownership threshold, Mexican banking regulators had established for such disclosures, M ller and Serrano faced two choices: work with Gradient and the lawyers to try to put together an alternative structure or syndicate the round among multiple investors, with no lead for their Series A. M ller and Serrano had deployed new fundraising approaches before. They had tapped an early crowdfunding platform for money, as well as friends and family and other angels. They had used a Mexican adaptation of SAFE notes, a financial instrument created by YC for early-stage fundraising. Could two designers turned fintech entrepreneurs get creative once again?