Welcome to Tech Talents! In this newsletter, I share real-time key talent movements in the LatAm tech ecosystem, including founders entering and exiting stealth mode, executive-level movements in unicorns, and partner-level changes in local VC firms.
Here’s a quick look at what you’ll find in this week’s edition:
📖 Recent Reads: The GenAI divide
🎊 Startup Launches: Time To Hire, Loadpass, Hicap
👀 Talents to Watch: Ex-Product Manager at Blip, ex-Principal Software Engineer at CloudWalk
🤫 Talents Entering Stealth: Ex-CTO at idwall, ex-Senior Group Product Manager at Pipefy, ex-CTO at Nubank & more
👋 Co-Founder Matching: Looking for an early or late-stage co-founder? Click here to be connected with top talent that matches your criteria
Let’s dive in…
📖 Recent Reads
My quick takes on interesting articles, news and data that I’ve come across recently.
As you might have guessed from my previous posts, I am a strong believer in the long-term potential of AI. However, this week we saw several developments that led the general public to question whether AI will truly be as transformative as once thought. Since it’s always valuable to consider different perspectives before forming our own conclusions, here are a few pieces I read recently that cast some doubt on AI’s potential:
MIT just released a study showing that despite $30–40B in enterprise investment in GenAI initiatives, 95% of organizations are seeing zero return from these projects. By contrast, there has been widespread adoption of consumer-grade tools like ChatGPT and Claude in these enterprises, which are more flexible and easier to use than custom, task-specific AI solutions. Still, the remaining 5% of organizations that have crossed the “GenAI divide” are already extracting millions in value and seeing workforce impacts in areas such as customer support, software engineering, and administrative functions. The reality is that AI is already embedded in nearly every enterprise, whether through custom tools or through general-purpose applications adopted by employees.
In a recent article from The New Yorker, the author argues that AI might not improve much beyond where it is today. To support this view, he highlights how the launch of GPT-5 felt like a far smaller step forward compared to the leap from GPT-3 to GPT-4. He also notes how the biggest AI players have shifted strategies by moving away from simply scaling pre-training (feeding models more data) toward refining post-training techniques to improve outcomes. While I agree that GPT-5 wasn’t as significant a breakthrough as previous jumps, it is still an advancement. And when comparing today’s models with those from just five years ago, it’s difficult to deny that we are experiencing exponential growth in this technology.
🎊 Startup Launches
Founders who have just publicly announced what they are working on.
Hicap
Overview
Startup Description: Building the largest network of LLM users and applications in the world.
Industry: AI
Team Size: 5
Time in Stealth: 3 months
Founder Profile
Juan Ansaldo Aguilar – Co-Founder at Hicap
Founder Highlights: Investor, Ex-Corporate
Previous Experience: ex-Associate at IGNIA Partners, ex-Investment Analyst at Cintra, ex-Investment Analyst at ACCIONA Energía, BBA in International Business from Royal Holloway, University of London.
Headquarters: Mexico
Co-Founders: Andres Girault, Ben Green
Ask for an Intro: Click here
Loadpass
Overview
Startup Description: Built on the foundation of open banking, their payments network connects banks, importers, exporters, and international logistics providers worldwide.
Industry: Logistics, Fintech
Team Size: 4
Time in Stealth: 1 year, 5 months
Founder Profile
Hygor Dupin – Founder & CEO at Loadpass
Founder Highlights: Serial Founder, Previous Exit, Y Combinator Alumni, Top University, Unicorn Experience
Previous Experience: ex-Co-founder at Sooper, ex-Corporate Strategy at Dock, ex-Finance and Operations at Velos Ag, ex-PE Investments at FORS Capital Partners, ex-First Lieutenant at FAB, Bachelor's in Engineering from ITA.
Headquarters: São Paulo, Brazil
Ask for an Intro: Click here
Time To Hire
Overview
Startup Description: Time to Hire was created to transform the outdated, biased, resume-first model into a seamless, human-centered experience that helps companies find the right people, and people find the right opportunities.
Industry: HR, AI
Team Size: 6
Time in Stealth: 7 months
Founder Profile
Enrique Daniel Zenteno Jiménez - Co-Founder & CTO at Time To Hire
Previously featured as a Stealth Founder in Tech Talents #20.
Founder Highlights: Serial Founder, Technical Founder, Masters, Previous Exit
Previous Experience: Ex-Co-Founder & CTO at Gus (acquired by Blip), ex-Engineering Director at Blip, ex-Head of Machine Learning at Hola Gus, ex-Computer Vision/Machine Learning Engineer at CONABIO, ex-Programmer Analyst at Sm4rt Predictive Systems.
Headquarters: Mexico City, Mexico
Co-Founders: Pablo Estevez Hinojosa, Miguel Silva Trujillo
Ask for an Intro: Click here
👀 Talents to Watch
High-potential individuals likely to make significant career moves soon.
This section is exclusive to Pro subscribers, but here is a snippet of the profiles covered in the past two weeks. To view the full profiles, try Tech Talents Pro for free for 14 days here.
Previous role in a unicorn & recent posts also indicate a stealth project
Founder Highlights: Serial Founder, Technical Founder, Masters, Previous Exit, Top University, Ex-Corporate, Latitud Fellow, Ex-Consultant, Unicorn Experience, Fintech
Previous Experience: Ex-Principal Software Engineer at CloudWalk, ex-Co-Founder at Scaleup, BE in Engineering from USP.
Headquarters: São Paulo, Brazil
Time in Current Position: N/A
Previous role in a scaleup, currently with no full-time position
Founder Highlights: Masters, Unicorn Experience, Scaleup Experience, SaaS
Previous Experience: ex-Product Manager at Blip, ex-Senior Business Analyst at Unicorn, Bachelor's in Economics from UFSJ.
Headquarters: Belo Horizonte, Brazil
Time in Current Position: N/A
🤫 Talents Entering Stealth
Talents with relevant experiences who have just entered stealth mode.
Vitor Olivier
Founder Highlights: Technical Founder, Top University, Ex-Corporate, Investor, Unicorn Experience
Previous Experience: ex-CTO at Nubank, ex-CHRO at Nubank, ex-VP of Operations & Platforms at Nubank, ex-General Manager - Brasil at Nubank, ex-Wealth Management - Trading and Strategy at BTG Pactual, Bachelor's in Computer Science and Economics from Duke University.
Headquarters: São Paulo, Brazil
Time in Current Position: 1 month
Ask for an Intro: Click here
Danilo Barsotti – Founder at Stealth Startup
Founder Highlights: Serial Founder, Technical Founder, Masters, Top University, Previous Exit, Ex-Corporate, Ex-Consultant, Unicorn Experience
Previous Experience: ex-CTO at idwall, ex-Director of Technology at Mercado Bitcoin, ex-CTO at ESTADÃO, ex-Head of Security Architecture Team at Banco Votorantim, MBA from FGV, Bachelor's in Sistemas da Informação from Faculdade Drummond.
Headquarters: São Paulo, Brazil
Time in Current Position: 1 month
Ask for an Intro: Click here
Henrick Farias – Co-Founder at Stealth Startup
Founder Highlights: Masters, Ex-Corporate, Ex-Consultant, Scaleup Experience
Previous Experience: ex-Strategy & Operations Director @ BEDU at Lottus Education, ex-LATAM Head of Sales - Founding Team at Jeeves, ex-Senior Consultant at KoreFusion, MBA from IPADE Business School, MBA from Smith School of Business at Queen's University, Bachelor's in Industrial Engineering from Universidad Iberoamericana.
Headquarters: Mexico
Time in Current Position: 1 month
Ask for an Intro: Click here
Juan Durán – Founder / Technical Product Manager at Stealth Startup
Stealth Description: One-man startup proving that modern AI & no-code/low-code tools let a single founder cover product, engineering, data, DevOps and growth.
Founder Highlights: Ex-Corporate, Unicorn Experience, Scaleup Experience
Previous Experience: Ex-Senior Group Product Manager at Pipefy, ex-Product Management Consultant at Sanjow, ex-Staff Product Manager at Addi, ex-Director Of Software Product Development at PagSeguro PagBank, ex-Ops Product Lead at Rappi, Postgraduate in Information Security from UNIBTA, Bachelor's in Engineering from Universidad Privada de Santa Cruz de la Sierra.
Headquarters: São Paulo, Brazil
Time in Current Position: 4 months
Ask for an Intro: Click here
Jose Garcia – Founder at Stealth Startup
Founder Highlights: Serial Founder, Technical Founder, Previous Exit, Top University, Ex-Big Tech, Ex-Corporate, Ex-Consultant
Previous Experience: Senior Product Manager P4 - App Platform at Zillow, ex-Senior Product Manager IC4 - Enterprise Platforms at Oracle, ex-CTO - Fintech at Sylon Advisory, ex-Product Manager at Accenture.
Headquarters: Mexico
Time in Current Position: 1 month
Ask for an Intro: Click here
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