Emerging Lending Marketplace Focused on Underbanked Hispanic Businesses Raises $750,000 in Seed Capital

LOS ANGELES, Nov. 9, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Camino Financial is an online lending marketplace primarily focused on deploying capital to the largest and fastest growing underbanked business segment in the U.S., Hispanic-owned businesses.  With the emergence of many new online lenders and credit marketplaces, Camino Financial expects to carve a sizeable niche in online business lending.  Recently published research by Geoscape estimates that 4.1 million U.S. based businesses are owned by Hispanics.  Based on this research, Hispanic-owned businesses grew 15x faster in 2012-15E compared to all U.S. firms.  Despite their size and growth profile, Hispanic-owned businesses struggle to get access to bank loans with approximately 6% of SBA 7(a)1 loans deployed to Hispanics in the last year (source: www.SBA.gov).

Camino Financial was co-founded by twin brothers, Sean and Kenny Salas, while completing their MBAs at Harvard Business School.  The Salas brothers were born from an entrepreneurial family.  The matriarch of the Salas family started a small Mexican restaurant and over the life of her career, opened over 30 locations in southern California.  Unfortunately, at the age of 12, Sean and Kenny saw the fall of the Mexican restaurant chain, a life changing event.  Drawing inspiration from their mother's story, the Salas brothers were determined to create a lending platform catered to solving unique problems facing the Hispanic business community.

"The Hispanic business owner has unique problems accessing capital, stemming from areas as deep as language, culture, and education," said Sean Salas, CEO.  "Lending to the Hispanic market is not as simple as translating your website to Spanish.  Our client is seeking an integrated customer experience that requires a tailored design across the business spectrum in brand, product, positioning, and customer service."

The Company is backed by institutional and angel investors including Collaborative Fund, all of whom offer deep expertise in online lending, commercial banking, and Hispanic marketing.  In particular, Collaborative Fund has significant domain expertise in the online lending space with investments in Bond Street, UpStart and InVenture.

With seed funding in place, Camino Financial will ramp-up its marketing efforts and build out its tech infrastructure for scalable growth.

"We are excited to grow our team and invest in infrastructure to seal partnerships that will enable us to build trust and help our community," said Kenny Salas, Co-Founder and VP of Operations & Finance.

Camino Financial also stands out as it joins the tiny minority (less than 1%) of venture-backed start-ups that are founded by Hispanics (source: CB Insights).

Sean states: "We have a dual sense of responsibility to Hispanics and other under-represented minorities aspiring to break the glass ceiling to access venture and bank capital.  We must validate that making a concentrated bet on Hispanic entrepreneurs and business owners is trend-setting bet that will generate above market returns.  Through Camino Financial, we plan to build momentum for re-investment in under-represented communities, including the Hispanic community.  And encourage these ventures be led by minority and women talent.  The potential is there, we just need to unlock it."

To learn more about Camino Financial visit www.caminofinancial.com.

About Camino Financial
Camino Financial is a credit marketplace matching small businesses with the most affordable funding option offered by its network of reputable lenders.  The Company specializes in originating loans for first-time business borrowers who cannot get a loan from a bank, and provides ongoing credit monitoring and advice to ensure clients improve their business credit in an effort to qualify for a bank loan.

Number of Hispanic owned businesses doubles

TUCSON, AZ (Tucson News Now) -The Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce released its fifth annual edition of the DATOS Tucson report on Oct. 6. According to a release, the report provides an overview of the state of the Hispanic market in southern Arizona, as well as statewide and nationally.

"Tucson and southern Arizona are vital to Arizona's overall economic prosperity, especially as it relates to our fast-growing partnership with Mexico," said Gonzalo A. de la Melena, Jr., President and CEO of the Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. "We're proud to deliver the message that Arizona's future is inextricably linked to the economic health of its exploding Hispanic population."

The release states the number of Hispanic-owned business have doubled statewide 2007, while the number of Latina-owned businesses has tripled.

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Now Open: 2016 Echoing Green Fellowship Application

The 2016 Echoing Green Fellowship application is now open! Echoing Green is accepting applications for our 2016 class of Fellows until November 17, 2015 at 2:00 pm ET. We’re looking for emerging leaders, driven by a strong sense of purpose, who are ready to challenge the status-quo as they tackle issues facing their communities across the globe. We’ve pulled together some sample language you can use to share this opportunity among your network: Twitter .@echoinggreen is seeking the world's most promising #socent! Apply for a 2016 Fellowship: http://www.echoinggreen.org/fellowship/apply Are you a #socent making #bigboldchange? @echoinggreen's 2016 Fellowship application is open! Details: http://www.echoinggreen.org/fellowship/apply Calling all #socent! Apply to @echoinggreen's 2016 #Global #Climate #BMA #Fellowship by 11/17! Details: www.echoinggreen.org/fellowship/apply .@echoinggreen is granting $90K to launch your idea to solve the world’s biggest problems. www.echoinggreen.org/apply #EGFellows #socent Facebook/LinkedIn Could you use up to $90,000 to launch your innovative idea, and change the world? @Echoing Green[https://www.facebook.com/echoinggreen]’s Fellowship Programs invest in next generation leaders working to solve the world’s biggest problems with up to $90,000 and individualized support to launch your enterprise. Apply by Nov. 17: www.echoinggreen.org/apply Helpful Links Apply Selection Criteria & Eligibility Application Timeline Fellowship FAQs

The next Silicon Valley is Latin America, says Gartner

Latin America is bound to make the most noise in innovation and digital business, according to IT research company Gartner.

"We are living the Latin America moment," said VP of research Patrick Meehan during the Gartner CIO & IT Executive Latin America Summit in Mexico City. He added that "no other region in the world" offers the same capacity to become the next IT world hub.

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Latino Small Business Owners Faced Challenges and Opportunities in Securing Funding

NEW YORK (September 10, 2015) – Today Biz2Credit, the leading online platform for small business funding, released a study showing that Latino small business loan applications grew 18 percent, however, Latino business owners lag behind in the necessary factors needed to secure financing such as annual revenue, credit scores, age of business and operating expenses.

The study found that the average annual revenue for Latino-owned businesses was $68,540, trailing slightly behind the average annual revenue of $70,641 for non-Latino-owned businesses (though an improvement from the previous year). Average operating expenses were also significantly lower at $18,334, contrasted with $24,857 for non-Latino businesses. The average age of Latino businesses was younger at 22 months vs. 25 months for non-Latino businesses. Meanwhile, the average credit score for Latino-owned businesses applying for loans was 603, compared to 614 for all others.

“This year's study was interesting because we found that Latino businesses made gains in number of loan applications and certain industries saw higher growth, however, they still need to catch up to non-Latino businesses in many areas,” said Rohit Arora, chief executive officer, Biz2Credit. “It’s an exciting time because Latinos are one of the fastest growing populations in the U.S. with 43 percent growth since 2007. We believe that this population will soon be on par or surpass non-Latino businesses.” 
 
The Top 5 states for Latino-owned small business loan applications were: Texas (16.4%), California and Florida tied at (15.7%), New York (9.1%) and – for the first time – Georgia (3.0%). All five states represented 60% of the loan requests made by Latinos in the past year.

The top industries that grew the most in the past year were: Services (30.5%), which grew 5%; followed by Transportation and Warehousing (8.8%), which grew 3%.

For more information on the study and to view the infographic, please click here. 

About the Biz2Credit Latino Small Business Credit Study
Biz2Credit analyzed the financial performance of more than 1,000 Latino-owned businesses with less than 250 employees and less than $10 million in annual revenues from across the country that have been in operation for more than 1 year, as well as startups.

About Biz2Credit
Founded in 2007, Biz2Credit has arranged more than $1.2 billion in small business financing and is widely recognized as the #1 online credit resource for startup loans, lines of credit, equipment loans, working capital and other funding options in the U.S. Using the latest technology, Biz2Credit matches borrowers to financial institutions based on each company's unique profile -- completed in less than four minutes -- in a safe, efficient, price-transparent environment. Visit www.biz2credit.com, follow on Twitter @Biz2Credit, and join on Facebook at www.facebook.com/biz2credit. See infographic here 

Sandra Diaz > www.diazandco.com

Sandra Diaz, Owner, Diaz & Co.

What do you need to be an entrepreneur?
Perseverance, curiosity, adaptability and ability to motivate others.

What inspired you to start your business?
People kept contacting me to advise them on developing a roadmap to market their products and services to U.S. Hispanics.

How did you finance it?
So far, from organic growth.

Does being Hispanic/Latina have any influence on your business?
It allows me to bring a personal point of view to client challenges in addition to the professional knowledge, which builds credibility.

In the face of adversity, how do you decide to drive ahead?
Prayer, engaging coaches and sharing with trusted peers to uncover new ways to tackle the issues.

What is the biggest challenge your business has faced?
Time management, especially trying to decide between good and best opportunities.

If you could change one thing about your business. What would it be?
I would like to have a partner.

What was your childhood ambition?
In grade school, to be an Astronomer. In high school, to be a Fashion Designer. My parents were scientists and my mom also owned several fashion and textile businesses.

Tell us about three entrepreneurs that you admire.
My mom, for her perseverance and leadership.
The late Tere Zubizarreta, for pioneering the Hispanic/ multicultural marketing industry as a woman in the 70s.
Carlos Santiago from Santiago Solutions Group, for his analytical approach to driving growth from cultural and generational segments.

For business meetings, which do you prefer: breakfast, lunch, or dinner?
Whatever works best with my commute schedule so that I do not have down time in between meetings.

What sacrifices in your personal life did you have to make in order to become successful in your business?
Moving from an apartment in Manhattan to a room in somebody else’s house in Brooklyn for four years to save on rent.

What is your favorite quote?
“I have had a lot of very expensive learning experiences, but I’ve never let them stop me from getting up in the morning and trying again.” Larry Levy, Co-Founder, Levy Restaurants; Chairman and CEO, The Levy Organization.

Is it difficult to be unconventional?
Not usually, but sometimes it feels lonely

Biggest mistake made?
Letting the tight timeline of a potential client dictate my way of communicating or doing business. And not giving people feedback before I decide to stop working with them.

Do you consider yourself an innovator? Why?
Yes because I like to find ways to challenge the status-quo and am always learning new things.

About Diaz & Co. 
Diaz & Co. is a boutique strategy consulting firm that equips brands and retailers to grow business and reduce inefficiencies by catering to U.S. Hispanics while meeting the needs of mainstream shoppers at the same time. Our strategic solutions and training enable companies to maximize the Hispanic appeal of their mainstream initiatives while identifying if and how they should pursue Hispanic-specific strategies to address any offering, messaging and/or media gaps.

Spain-US Start-up Competition

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43 lessons growing from $0 to $1+ million in revenue, twice

I realized the other day that we’ve grown from $0 to $1 million with two separate products (HelloSign and HelloFax). This happened a long time ago, but I was recently reflecting on the lessons.

I found a lot of growth truisms to be false. We’ve learned a lot. Some lessons were painfully won, which is why I may sound strongly opinionated about them. They also may be slanted towards B2B products, but I wouldn’t discount them if you’re not in that space.

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Intel launches investment fund for minority, women-led firms

SANTA CLARA, California (AP) — Intel is launching a $125 million investment fund for technology startups led by women and minorities, a move the chipmaker says is aimed at changing the face of Silicon Valley.

The new fund, which is unusual for its focus on minority-led companies, is part of a broader effort that Intel CEO Brian Krzanich has launched amid widespread criticism of a U.S. tech industry dominated by white male executives and investors.

Krzanich announced plans earlier this year to spend $300 million on diversity efforts and pledged to make Intel's workforce and executive ranks more closely resemble the U.S. workforce by 2020. Intel has previously said its workforce is about 24 percent female and 12 percent black and Hispanic. The U.S. workforce is about 47 percent women and 26 percent black and Hispanic.

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BCC to target Hispanic businesses with accelerator

Hispanic entrepreneurs could soon reap the benefits of a program in the Meadowlands specifically aimed at helping Latino startups.

Bergen Community College has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Statewide Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey to develop a start-up assistance program, or business accelerator, that both organizations believe would be the first in New Jersey aimed specifically at Latinos.

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Jersey City holds Hispanic Entrepreneur and Small Business Conference

Jersey City held its first Hispanic Entrepreneur and Small Business Conference at City Hall on Wednesday to offer services to those trying to start, grow or expand Jersey City small businesses.

Attendees heard from a number speakers and officials, including Carlos Medina, president of the Statewide Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey; Maria Nieves, president and CEO of the Hudson County Chamber of Commerce; and Chris Murphy, manager of Statewide Strategic Initiatives for the New Jersey Department of Labor.

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What it’s like to be a Latino entrepreneur in Silicon Valley

SAN JOSE, Calif.—Alex Murillo leans forward in his seat, sipping coffee from a shot glass and waving his hands as he talks. He points to the screen of his MacBook Pro, explaining the genius behind Audive, the mobile application he is developing that allows users to record cover songs and mix tracks with music enthusiasts around the world.

“This is the secret sauce,” says Murillo, hitting a key on his computer that fills the air with the sound of a man singing in Italian. “You can bring in vocals from a guy in Italy or you can bring in the flamenco guitar from Spain.”

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