Latinx businesses have made up half of all net new business growth over the last ten years, despite unfair access to capital. According to a Small Business Credit Study by the Federal Reserve Banks, 45% of the Latinx applicants got denied for insufficient credit history, while white applicants had a rate of only 33%. Even so, Latinx founders have not let these statistics stand in their way as they continue to capture new markets.
As Latinx entrepreneurs continue to break boundaries and scale their businesses, the Stanford Graduate School of Business projects that they will contribute $1.4 trillion in revenue to the U.S. economy by 2050.
In honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, we’re spotlighting 6 Latinx entrepreneurs and their inspiring success as diverse leaders.
Meet 6 Latinx Entrepreneurs and Founders
1. Daniella Pierson, Founder, CEO, Co-CEO
At only 27 years old, Daniella has founded two thriving companies. While studying at Boston University, Daniella launched The Newsette in 2015, a newsletter for women featuring news and career advice. The company is now worth more than $200 million without any VC funding and has reached 500k women across the globe. Most recently, Pierson co-founded Wondermind in 2021 with Selena Gomez and Mandy Teefay. WonderMind is also a newsletter focused on offering tools to support follower’s mental wellbeing.
2. Yamillet Payano, Co-Founder and CEO
Yamillet founded SignSpeak in 2021 to close the gap in communication between people who are deaf or hard of hearing and primarily hearing individuals. SignSpeak is an AI SaaS product that provides automatic, real-time captioning and ASL to English interpreting services online and through their app, enabling those who are deaf or hard of hearing equal opportunities to engage.
3. Javier Arguello, Founder and Executive Director
While a graduate fellow at MIT, Javier was researching cognitive science and realized that the research surrounding how people learn was not being applied to the ways educators are taught to approach teaching in their classrooms. To increase access for teachers everywhere to teaching techniques that can help minimize learning disparities and offer every student the resources they need to flourish, Javier explains, “We are committed to equity and serving marginalized communities, so we [democratized] access to our programs through a technology platform and expert coaching we provide.” Javier and his team are enriching the lives of countless students around the world one school and educator at a time.
4. Eduardo Medina, Co-Founder
As one of the highest funded Black and LatinX startups, BetterUp supports business leaders through 1:1 coaching in order to help companies and their leadership teams’ overall wellbeing. Used by some of the largest global companies, including Google, AirBnb, and Hilton, BetterUp’s AI Platform offers resources to build a culture of diversity, inclusion, and belonging.
5 & 6. Mariza Hardin, Co-Founder and COO, Erik Cardenas, Co-Founder and CEO
Zócalo Health is transforming the Latinx community’s experience with healthcare. By providing easy access to prescription renewals, personal health counseling, tips on nutrition, exercise, stress management, and other lifestyle changes, Mariza and Erik’s company is making healthcare more accessible to one of the fastest growing populations in North America.
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