Co-authored by John Buttrick.
Each year, Mexico exports over $325 billion of goods to the US alone. However, SMEs represent only a tiny fraction – just 10% – of this massive business opportunity. This is largely structural, as SMEs have major financial obstacles when trading internationally: lack of working capital, currency exposure, and customer non-payment risk.
In keeping with our thesis on broadening access to capital, we are excited to announce our investment in Mundi, tackling this opportunity head on. While we have made several investments in our access to capital thesis focused on Latin American consumers, this is our first B2B investment in the region.
Mundi launched in July 2020 as a financial services platform for cross-border trade, starting with invoice-based financing for SME exporters in Mexico. This factoring product is non-recourse, fully digital, and has much faster approval times (< 24 hours) than current options. This allows Mexican exporters and freight forwarders to grow their book of business through exports. Since launching, Mundi has also rolled out an FX management product, with several more exciting features already on the roadmap.
Mundi’s customers manufacture everything from candy to toys to automobile parts. On average, customers see an impressive bump of 28% growth in export revenue in the first three months after using Mundi. By sitting at the most central part of the transaction – over $120 million in invoice payments – Mundi is building a unique data network.
We are excited to back Mundi’s co-founder and CEO, Martin, and the exceptional senior team he has assembled from some of Latin America’s best startups in their next phase of growth alongside existing investors FJ Labs and Base10.