LatAm ICT financing, investment watch

By 2028, over 35% of IT budgets in the biggest 5,000 companies in Latin America are expected to be allotted to investments in connectivity, security, compute and data assets used to deliver their own as-a-service processes and smart products.

That is one of the chief forecasts provided by market research firm IDC in its FutureScape 2023 predictions report.

Overall, IDC projects Latin America IT spending to grow 5% in 2023 in a baseline scenario and 2% in a worst-case scenario. Argentina (up 7%), Brazil (up 6%) and Mexico (up 6%) are expected to lead growth in the baseline forecast.

According to IDC, the growing digitization of businesses in the region increased corporate IT spending by 9 percentage points in 2021 from the previous year.

The research firm lists the US economy, the Ukraine war and “policy uncertainty” in the region as vectors of risk for the LatAm IT market.

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 Brazilian agtech Seedz snapped up US$16.5mn in a series A round to expand its credit operations, carry out acquisitions and enhance its platform.

The round was led by Alexia Ventures, with participation of VOX Capital, Volpe Capital, The Yield Lab, Tridon, 10b (Tarpon), Endeavor Scale-Up and Parceiro Ventures, as well as individual investors, the company reported.

Founded in 2017, Seedz offers a subscription-based customer relationship management (CRM) solution, rewards programs, and payment solutions to farmers.

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 Chilean foodtech unicorn Notco raised US$70mn in a series D round led by Princeville Capital, in its first capital injection in the startup.

The round also saw the participation of Marcos Galperin, founder and CEO of MercadoLibre, as well as existing investors Tiger Global, Jeff Bezos’ Bezos Expeditions, Kaszek Ventures, Future Positive and The Craftory.

The company is currently valued at around US$1.5bn. 

Investment plans include boosting its artificial intelligence platform used to map the molecular structure of animal protein foods to build plant-based recipes, and physical expansion, including office openings in Brazil.

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Brazil's electric-electronic industry projects nominal growth of 5% in sales in 2023 to around 231bn reais (US$34.5bn), according to industry trade group Abinee.

The group said this year sales will be 220bn reais, up 4% nominally but down 2% after inflation. 

Around 58% of members surveyed by Abinee expect their sales/orders to grow in 2023, 33% expect them to be flat and 9% to decline.