Cometa
Together with:
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021, educational institutions faced an unprecedented challenge - a rapid shift towards digitalization.
Overnight, schools had to adapt to new teaching, communication, and administration methods.
Let's dive in.
Imagine this
As a seasoned educator and owner of a local school, managing its operations presents unique challenges.
You have to track hundreds of student tuition payments, many of whom have personalized arrangements for deadlines, scholarships, and invoicing preferences.
Month over month, you’re losing visibility over the business’s health without accurate reporting and must stay up several late nights to track your cash flows.
You specialize in education, not accounting. So, you ask other school owners, and they recommend Cometa.
A new platform they have recently integrated to solve this problem at their schools.
Explain it like I'm five
Cometa is a digital platform that streamlines collection and cash flow management for private schools in Mexico.
They provide schools a platform to administer payments, invoicing, and reconciliations.
School administrators can easily organize and understand their financial data to make better decisions.
They offer parents an easy-to-use payment platform for their kid’s education.
Founders aim to increase access to quality education by streamlining schools’ financial operations.
The ABCs
Industries: Fintech
Headquarters: Mexico City
Year Operations Started: 2022
Team Size: 30
Raised: USD 5M (Seed)
Investors: Kaszek, Reach Capital, Homebrew, Latitud
Business Model: Vertical saas, payments
Other players:
Background check
What we like:
Business Intelligence: They organize and simplify financial historical activity so school administrators can understand and visualize schools’ income. Showing them who has late payments, paid, and the history of this data eventually can lead schools to make better decisions.
Opportunity: Startups in Latin America have found success in digitalizing education. Cometa’s approach is to give financial tools to private schools. In Mexico, only about 40% of private schools accept payments with credit cards. Founders claim that word of mouth, referrals, and 100%+ net revenue retention between 22-23 and 23-24 school cycles are fueling growth.
Complementary Approach: The founders value the importance of human relationships between school administrators and parents. Their software streamlines school operations, enabling smarter decision-making with less effort without seeking to replace traditional methods, all while offering parents a more convenient payment experience.
Future: Cometa’s team is layering on additional administrative and financial tools to continue adding value to school administrators in Mexico. They want to grow locally with a proven solution that schools and parents trust, with the opportunity to expand in LatAm in the coming years.
Road Blocks:
Onboarding: According to founders, integrating new schools into their platform is smooth; the hard part is getting administrators and parents to use it efficiently. In other words, convincing parents to use the platform for payments and getting schools to embrace the technology can be a hassle.
Trust: Implementing a new platform in a school is not something you can do from one day to another. Cometa has to earn the school community's trust through deep relationships with directors and delivering an excellent experience managing school finances.
Tech stack: Most schools that are already well-established already use various software systems for their financial administration. Adding or replacing another platform into its existing systems can be complex.
The Architects
Andres Benavides, Co-Founder & CEO. Stanford MBA. Previously @ Codeable.
Mateo Creamer, Co-Founder & CPO. Stanford MBA. Previously @ RapidSOS.
Gonzalo Gallardo, Co-Founder & COO. Stanford MBA. Previously @ Affirm.
Request intro with founders by sending an email to gabriel@readrunway.com
Together with Tecnológico de Monterrey
Do you find it difficult to understand financial reports? According to Mercer Marsh Benefits, employees spend around 6 working hours per week thinking about their financial situation, which costs companies between 2% and 4% of their economic results.
Understand and analyze corporate finance and make appropriate decisions. Study the Finance for Non-Financial Professionals in Industry Certificate at Tecnológico de Monterrey, the best private university in Mexico according to Times Higher Education's (THE) Latin America University Rankings 2023 and QS University Rankings 2022.
Headlines Corner
Syscap secures a US $2.3M funding round to transform private credit in Mexico. Wollef led the round. (TechCrunch)
Talana, a Chilean HR tech, raised US $8M to expand its operations in LatAm. Venturance and Altis led the round. (Contxto)
Nubank will start offering personal loans in Mexico. They reported record revenues of US$ 1.9 billion last quarter. (Reuters)
Praso, a Brazilian food tech startup, raised US 9.5M. Valor Capital Group and NFX led the round. (Bloomberg)
Founders Bookmarks
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