Argentina and Uruguay: Unicorn candidates according to Globant and GeneXus founders

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Guibert Englebienne, co-founder of the Argentinean software giant Globant (GLOB), and Nicolás Jodal of the Uruguayan GeneXus are two leading entrepreneurs in the technology industry in their countries. The companies, which announced on Wednesday, April 20, an agreement whereby Globant acquired GeneXus, are positioned as success stories in the region and set the pattern of some steps to follow for the insertion in international markets.

During an interview with Bloomberg Linea, Englebienne and Jodal recommended looking at the right market, thinking in the long term as keys to success, and highlighting the flexibility of the software created in Latin America. But they were also consulted about which companies in Argentina and Uruguay could be positioned in the future as unicorns, understood as those worth more than US$1 billion.

In Argentina, Globant, MercadoLibre (MELI), and Despegar (DESP) were in this category until 2021, and last year others such as Aleph, Bitfarms (BITF), Mural, Tiendanube, Ualá and Vercel joined. In Uruguay, the only one is the fintech dLocal (DLO).

For Englebienne, the Argentine companies emerging are Satellogic, already on the way to becoming a unicorn, and Etermax. He also highlighted Technisys, recently acquired by the North American SoFi Technologies. “They are super interesting companies that one should bet that they will go on to do great things,” he told Bloomberg Linea. In the case of Uruguay, Jodal mentioned Abya, which he integrates and sees as “a very good opportunity”.

WHAT DOES EACH ONE OF THEM DO AND PROPOSE?

SATELLOGIC

The Argentine nanosatellite company founded in 2010 by Emiliano Kargieman and Gerardo Richarte went public on the New York Stock Exchange at the end of January 2022 and is pointed out by different entrepreneurs and market analysts as a firm candidate among the next Argentine unicorns. The company’s objective dedicated to the satellite industry is to contribute to the generation of high-definition images of the Earth that will enable the implementation of solutions for logistics, supply, and food chains. By the end of 2025, they aim to have a constellation of at least 200 satellites.

ETERMAX

The company, founded in 2009 by Máximo Cavazzani, is a video game developer and has a division dedicated to offering marketing and advertising services within the entertainment industry for different brands and agencies. They also have another vertical focused on artificial intelligence. One of the company’s milestones in 2014 was the launch of the game Preguntados, available on iOS and Android. Since 2017, they also have offices in Berlin, Germany. According to company data, the total downloads of their products were more than 800,000, and they have 500 employees.

ABYA

Uruguayan Abya is also within the gamer universe. In particular, it defines itself as “a Netflix” of video games. Last year, Jodal, together with Franco Macieli and Waldemar Fernández, also Uruguayan, launched a cloud gaming platform that offers users a catalog of games in the cloud. It aims to position itself as a leader in the region to capture more than 100 million users.

TECHNISYS

According to an announcement made in February of this year, the Argentine digital banking company Tecnisys, founded by Miguel Santos, was sold to SoFi Technologies for US$1.1 billion. The platform allows financial institutions to create customized financial products dynamically while offering recommendations to customers.

With information from Bloomberg Línea