Comments on: How a Mormon VC ended up betting everything on Mexico

By: Donald Gene Taylor

Donald Gene Taylor — Wed, 30 May 2012 19:57:20 +0000

Paul, Mormons are in the news every day now–after we’ve been under the radar for so long. My wife’s blog responds to political and religious issues, and some girl talk, etc. We found this favorable article linked by fairLDS.org; I respond to some of the negative ones, giving an LDS perspective. http://www.eveoutofthegarden.com/2012/05/where-do-those-contributions-to-mormon.html?utm_source=BP_recent

By: Efrain Gutierrez

Efrain Gutierrez — Wed, 23 May 2012 05:41:07 +0000

Hello Mr Ahlstrom,
Very interesting article about what you have started in Mexico with your VC firm.

I am based in Monterrey and I’m selected for the ceremony of the E100 Top 100 Enterpreneurs on next week. It is great that ALTA Innovation Institute is sponsoring this kind of initiatives, thanks!

Are you assiting to this event? We’re in contact with the team of “The HUB DF”, friends of Rafe Furst, because I have the project (with some other friends) to open “The HUB Monterrey” and we would really like presenting it to ALTA Ventures.

Your slides are very interesting, thanks for posting them!

Br,
Efrain Gutierrez

By: eduardo s

eduardo s — Thu, 17 May 2012 06:04:10 +0000

Thank you for stopping by Startup Weekend everyone… it was an honor

By: Paul Ahlstrom

Paul Ahlstrom — Wed, 16 May 2012 20:53:57 +0000

Katie thanks for the write up. Thanks Dave for the kind words. Yes my mom lived in little town called Colonial Juarez in the state of Chih MX, the Romney’s lived down the road.

Dave McClure and many others have requested I put my slides up on Slideshare. So here is a link to the market research slides.
http://tinyurl.com/7d9ghwo (I will leave them up here for a couple of weeks.)

By: Paul Ahlstrom

Paul Ahlstrom — Wed, 16 May 2012 16:44:24 +0000

Brian – glad to answer. (The voice over helps a lot.) We looked at it as a combination of attractiveness/readiness of the market for VC/PE versus the underserved nature of the market (lack of capital). There are slides later in the deck that probably should be up front to better walk through the logic. For example, if you look at slide 51 it compares the relative attractiveness of Mexico (slides such as 18, 44 & 48) and the fact that there is limited institutional capital available -(slide 43, 54, 74). Mexico is relatively attractive in compared to other regions because of its strong entrepreneurial ecosystem support, aligned government, regulatory initiatives, etc.. It was astonishing to us that a trillion dollar economy sitting next to the worlds largest economy was missing the VC asset class and the PE was significantly underserved.

I am fascinated to learn what you are doing in Indonesia. (Reach out to me directly when you get a moment.) We are tracking several up-and-coming regions that are growing in attractiveness– Turkey, Indonesia, Columbia, Peru and Argentina are on our radar. Best – Paul

By: Michael de la Maza

Michael de la Maza — Wed, 16 May 2012 12:09:20 +0000

I met Paul during Geeks on a Plane and found him to be brilliant and hardworking. His book “Nail It, then Scale It!” is a great synopsis of lean/agile ideas with actionable steps.

By: Brian S

Brian S — Wed, 16 May 2012 11:36:19 +0000

Thanks Paul, I appreciate the slides–very interesting! I follow much of the logic with the exception of how you made the transition from the ‘Narrowed Field’ (slide 17 & 18) to an analysis of BRICs vs. Mexico. Wondering if you could help me fill in the blank a bit.

Thanks again for posting!

Brian
Fellow BYU alum running a VC focused on Indonesia.

By: Paul Ahlstrom

Paul Ahlstrom — Tue, 15 May 2012 22:41:15 +0000

Katie thanks for the write up. Thanks Dave for the kind words. Yes Katie it is true, my mom lived in little town called Colonial Juarez the Romney’s lived down the road in the next town called Colonial Dublan it is just outside of Casas Grandes Chihuahua Mexico.

By: Mr. Ahlstrom's son

Mr. Ahlstrom's son — Tue, 15 May 2012 21:38:05 +0000

The Romney family lived in Colonia Juarez, Chihuahua near my grandmother. George Romney, Mitt’s father, left at the age of 5 along with many other Mormons after Mexican revolutionaries threatened the colony. My family stayed until my grandma left for college.

By: Rafael Solis

Rafael Solis — Tue, 15 May 2012 17:19:52 +0000

Having visited Mexico several times over the last 6 months, including my wedding in San Miguel de Allende, I was amazed to meet several folks in the tech community. There’s already a vibrant “nearshore” sector that will certainly feed into the entrepreneurial ventures as capital flows in. What a change from when I lived/interned there 10 years ago. Great work!