Paulo Campos: Founding Philippines ZALORA & Kaya Founders Venture Capital Lessons - E685
episode
BRAVE Southeast Asia Tech: Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam, Philippines, Thailand & Malaysia Startups, Founders & Venture Capital VC (English)
56 min
1 speaker
8 chapters
transcribed 19 days ago
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How did Paulo’s childhood in 1990s Manila shape his mission to create jobs?
There was a v higher probability that Wouldn't work out and I'd be six to twelve months out of a job. I mean out of BCG and having to r rebuild my career from there. But something about being able to come home to the Philippines that ultimately was my end goal.
At that time, Philippines was a frontier market in what you mentioned, 2021 you're saying it's a Cambrian explosion. That's right. But from a Singapore's perspective, no one saw it yet. Yeah, no one saw it. Yeah. Philippines? Philippines?
This flywheel really started to spin through the twenty twenty period. So come twenty twenty-one. Specifically, latter part, we decided that this was the beginning of a long-term trend and we were really witnessing the birth of the venture ecosystem in the Philippines here. So we set up Kaya Founders to bring great businesses that will solve the most important problems in the The Philippines. In this era, in this interest rate environment, you really need to build a lasting, sustainable, profitable business almost out of the gate, frankly. So the fact that the companies being built today are of that mold and we don't have any legacy overhang that other markets might be experiencing, I think puts us in a perfect position today to be the most exciting venture ecosystem in Southeast Asia.
It's a great time. Time to both build and invest in the Philippines.
Welcome to Brave. Learn from Southeast Asia's best tech leaders. Build the future, learn from our past, and stay human in between. No BS on Success. I'm Jeremy Al, Venture Capitalist, Sarah founder, Harvard MBA, science fiction nerd, and dad of two daughters. Every week, we debate startup news, interview change makers. answer listener questions and share personal insights. Join our movement of over 40,000 members and get transcripts, resources and community at www.bravesdea.com. Stay well and stay brave. Hey Paulo, so excited to have you on
the show. Hey Jeremy, welcome to Manila. Great to have you and I'm very excited to be on the Brave podcast with you.
I'm glad we can finally make it work. I think you're such a legend in the investing in the Philippine space. Yeah, not at all,
but thank you. I'm happy to be here. So, Paolo, could you just introduce yourself real quick? Sure. I'm Paolo Campos. I'm the founding managing partner of Kaya Founders. Yeah. We set up Kaya Founders four and a half years ago when we saw that there is really a specific opportunity in the Philippines, great founders emerging. Our focus is in the early stage. So we invest anywhere from pre-seed to series A. And we do that currently out of our second fund, which is split into two sections. Subfunds. Yeah. We have the pre-seed zero to one fund, we call it. In the Philippines, there's really a lot of action in this stage of the journey. A lot of founders or would-be founders becoming founders. So So we support, you know, pre-seed and idea stage or day zero companies, as we say, out of the gate through our zero to one fund.
And then we have a later stage vehicle called the one to ten fund that invests seed to series A. So in the last four and a half years we've been busy. We've invested in fifty companies over that time. And we've been really excited about what we've been seeing with the ecosystem emerging in the Philippines.
That's fantastic. And I think we've had the opportunity to obviously share deals and look at companies together in the Philippines. Including an active one,
which we
can
share for the next episode.
A little suspense, you know, it's like, Oh, which company is this? We missed out. They're like checking on our portfolio. So it was that Vendagra. Exactly. No, uh, but I think let's go back all the way to the beginning, right? Which is, I mean, as a kid, would did you ever know you're gonna become a venture capitalist? Certainly not,
certainly not. I mean, I think I'm a typical Asian kid in the sense that my parents always told me to work for a big company and like get a stable corporate job. Yeah. I did grow up in Manila though, so I grew up in the Philippines and in the Kind of eighties and nineties.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
How did Paulo’s childhood in 1990s Manila shape his mission to create jobs?
0:00–6:05
2
Why did Paulo leave a high‑paying Wall Street/BCG career to co‑found ZALORA Philippines?
6:05–12:45
3
What was the breakthrough “Masterstroke” that unlocked e‑commerce in the Philippines?
12:45–19:46
4
How did the team build ZALORA from a 10 m² room to a multi‑country operation?
19:46–25:32
5
Why was Cash‑On‑Delivery the key to scaling e‑commerce in an archipelago with low credit‑card penetration?
25:32–32:36
6
What sparked the “Cambrian explosion” of startups in Manila after the 2020 pandemic?
32:36–40:41
7
How does the “Language Lock” advantage and returning diaspora (“sea turtles”) fuel the Philippine VC ecosystem?
40:41–48:37
8
What lessons does Paulo share about building and investing in tech during today’s high‑interest‑rate climate?
48:37–56:23
Speakers
1 identifiedMore from BRAVE Southeast Asia Tech: Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam, Philippines, Thailand & Malaysia Startups, Founders & Venture Capital VC (English)
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