"Is the accelerator model working in Latin America?"

Last week I moderated a panel called "is the accelerator model working in Latin America?"  The event was put on by LAVCA (Latin American Private Equity and Venture Capital Association).   I am obviously interested in the start-up world here but am also curious how it is working in other places around the world.  I see new economies and opportunites happening here and want to hear if this model is working in other areas of the world.  The answer is, it is.  Different perhaps but working.

There were three panelists who I really hope I can keep in touch with.  Frederico Lacerda who is the co-founder of 21212 located in Rio de Janiero, Cesar Salazar who is the Venture Partner at 500 Startups  located in Mexico City and Gonzola Costa who is the founding partner of NXTP Labs located in Buenos Aires.  Each of these men have either been entrepreneurs or investors and what they are doing for the Latin American community is inspiring. 

Each of them are not only engaging the entrepreneurs who are interested in going through the accelerator program that is offered but they are reaching out to investors, Government officials and alike to create a road map for each company to grow and hopefully succeed.  I believe one of the reasons for success in the tech start-up world is the supportive community that has grown around it.  All three of them are working on just that. 

Of course every country has a different trajectory but as the world gets flatter, roads get crossed.  Will we see a Latin American start-up grow to be as large at Facebook one day and go public in the US marketplace?  We might and that would certainly prove the model that we are all united through this thing we call the world wide web.