MercadoLibre, Telefónica partnership extended to Colombia, Mexico

Latin American e-commerce group MercadoLibre (Nasdaq: MELI) has extended its partnership with Spanish telecom giant Telefónica's (NYSE:TEF) startup accelerator Wayra to Colombia and Mexico, adding to the previously announced Brazilianand Argentine markets, according to a joint statement. MercadoLibre will co-invest with Wayra in the entrepreneur ecosystem with a focus particularly on supporting start-ups that make use of MercadoLibre's APIs. Argentina was the first country to benefit from the partnership, announced last May by the two companies. Since then, three Argentine companies (Parsimotion, Nubimetrics and MrPresta) have each received US$100,000 to develop their projects. On September 4, MercadoLibre announced plans to finance Brazilian entrepreneurs with resources from its MercadoLibre Commerce Fund, channeling up to US$10mn. Apart from Brazil, Wayra has initiatives in twelve other countries: Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Argentina, Chile, Venezuela, Uruguay, Spain, the UK, Ireland, Germany and the Czech Republic. In Latin America, Wayra has supported 155 start-ups with investments of US$8.2mn in Bogotá, Buenos Aires, Caracas, Mexico City, Lima, Santiago and São Paulo.