On August 29, 2014, the first agribusiness challenge “Innovagro 2014” took place in San Miguel Allende, in the Guanajuato province of Mexico, with financial support from two important businesses in this sector: Rivas and FMC. Eight universities responded to the call by sending their two best entrepreneurs with projects that address the challenge: having an impact on one million people in five years or less. The final winner will have the opportunity to embark on an immersion trip to Silicon Valley.
It was a day full of activities that started with a workshop about business modeling and pitching led by Henrik Scheel from Silicon Valley’s Startup Experience. During the workshop, participants fine-tuned their business models and pitches. Following lunch, they returned to the majestic “chapel” at the heart of the Texas A&M campus, where a panel of top-level mentors awaited: Carlos Rivas and Carlos Jurado from Agroquimicos Rivas, the event’s sponsor; Adriana Tortajada, director of High-Impact and Funds at INADEM; Geronimo Villanueva, CEO of Si o Si Alimentos; Salvador Jimenez, CEO of Valle Organico, and Mauricio Usabiaga, CEO of Susazon. All of the mentors showed a strong commitment to offering feedback for each entrepreneur, giving advice and final words to participants before their pitches.
And so the pitches started, moderated by Manuel Morato, head of Startup Bus in Mexico, who focused entrepreneurs on the three minutes they each had to present their ideas. The panel of mentors then proceeded to evaluate and provide feedback to each entrepreneur until they had clarity of the impact level of each proposal. Each member of the panel then issued pitch-dollar “checks” to the entrepreneur with various amounts ranging from zero to 100,000. The entrepreneur who accumulated the most capital was Santiago Gutierrez from the University of Guanajuato with his project “Green Gas”. Santiago will be in Silicon Valley at the start of 2015 to continue fine-turning his business model.