NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

By Christine Hall

Brazil and Mexico are most known as Latin America’s hot startup ecosystems, but other countries, like Colombia, are gaining visibility and interest from investors.

One of the investors seeing promise in this country is Marathon Ventures, which closed its first fund of $26 million, touted as one of the country’s largest funds to date.

Alejandro Echavarria and Leon Papu, both managing partners, co-founded the venture capital firm in 2020 with Pablo Navarro, operating partner, to focus on early-stage, business-to-business startups in emerging markets. Their plan is to fund about 20 companies in fintech, SaaS and marketplaces.