The Co-Founder and General Partner of Newtopia VC and Co-Founder and former CTO of Mural, Patricio Jutard, was present at Endeavor Experience Buenos Aires 2022 , participating in the section «Land of Unicorns».
In a hand in hand with Mateo Salvatto, founder of Asteroid, Patricio spoke about his first steps as an entrepreneur, how did Mural started and grew, one of the Argentine unicorns, and the momentum it had in the pandemic due to the increase of remote work in companies.
He also shared what it meant to leave that company to devote himself fully to Newtopia VC and how he experiences his current role as an investor.
– How did you start venturing?
I studied in Argentina, I studied to become a computer engineer, I worked on several projects related to software development.
In 2004 I met Mariano Suarez-Battan, current CEO of Mural, and with the idea of making video games we founded Three Melons, which was later acquired by Disney.
– Throughout the process, what were the main problems you faced and what did you learn?
I believe that being an entrepreneur needs that courage to go ahead without measuring the consequences too much, although later one realizes that it is very, very difficult.
The change of mindset for me is something very important on this path, having a more global vision, wanting to conquer the world and always going for more, and Endeavor had a lot to do with that.
– How was Mural started? What is it and what problem does it solve?
Mural is an online collaboration platform that basically helps any work team that is trying to innovate and create something new, be it a product, a service or a company, to solve a problem in a creative way.
It seeks to replicate the meetings in real life where the teams have whiteboards and post-it notes, but taking it to virtuality.
It arose as the solution to a personal problem that we had with Mariano to design video games at Disney, since for that purpose we worked with people from different parts of the world and it was very difficult. So, that’s how we found this problem to solve and we left to found Mural 11 years ago.
– What happened to Mural in the pandemic?
That was the famous «lucky break», because the pandemic came to revolutionize the way humanity collaborates, we learned to work well remotely.
When the pandemic came, we were already prepared and growing, because this trend towards remote work had already begun to be a reality before.
– How did Newtopia come about?
Particularly, I always invested. Mural came from the pandemic, from having grown a lot, and the process was very difficult. In parallel, I wanted to continue helping new entrepreneurs.
That’s where Newtopia started, when I got together with a dream team made up of Mariano Mayer, Juan Pablo Lafosse, Sacha Spitz and Jorge Aguado. We are a very good team because each one contributes from a different experience and that makes it very complementary. A few months later, I stepped down as CPO of Mural to dedicate myself fully to Newtopia.
Newtopia is a fund whose purpose is to help create many companies that are solving a problem for society, creating knowledge, providing jobs, innovating and changing the reality of Latin America, which is also full of opportunities.
Newtopia helps them when they are just starting out, in the very early stages, which is where entrepreneurs need it most.
To conclude, and after a brief overview of his career, from his first venture, Three Melons, through Disney, the birth of Mural and now as an investor in Newtopia VC, Patricio explained the importance of this new role for him, at the personal level: «The world of VC enables the possibility that guys like me at 24 years old can venture,» he explained.
In addition, he added as a final reflection:
“Who put up the money for Newtopia to exist? Entrepreneurs who did well before. That is why we are entrepreneurs helping entrepreneurs.”
Today, Mural is trusted by 95% of the Fortune 100, including innovative teams from IBM, Intuit, Microsoft, GitLab, Steelcase, Thoughtworks, and Atlassian. And for its part, Newtopia VC managed to invest in 52 projects in 10 Latin American countries in one year.
After the talk with Patricio, the “Land of Unicorns” section continued with interviews with Santiago Sosa, Co-Founder & CEO of Nuvemshop | Tiendanube and Guillermo Rauch, CEO of Vercel. All interviews were recorded on the official Endeavor site where you can listen to them.At Newtopia we are excited to continue spreading entrepreneurial energy in order to transform Latin America, which, as Patricio said, is full of opportunities.
So.. are you an entrepreneur and you want to get in touch with us to analyze what you are building? That’s great! We really appreciate that interest.
If after reading our Manifest, you consider that you check all of the boxes, do not hesitate applying to Newtopia!
