Billionaire Lemann Says He’d Dive Into Tech If Given Do-Over

(Bloomberg) -- Jorge Paulo Lemann made his multibillion-dollar fortune in Brazil’s banking and consumer-products industries starting in the 1970s. Given a chance to do it all over, the 81-year-old says he’d be a tech entrepreneur instead.

“Unfortunately, I’m not that young anymore and I already have a few businesses to carry on my back, or I’d throw myself open-chested into the tech industry,” Lemann said Thursday during a live broadcast on entrepreneurship.

One of the masterminds behind some of the biggest consumer-product mergers of all time, Lemann said Brazil has “an enormous market for new products,” and the rate of new tech startups in the nation will speed up regardless of how the economy fares. Stock surges for firms such as e-commerce giant MercadoLibre Inc. and payments fintech StoneCo Ltd. are also amping up tech firms’ creation in Brazil.

“There’s nothing like a good stock rally to spur new entrepreneurs,” Lemann said at the event, which was hosted by Cubo, a startup hub created by Itau Unibanco Holding SA.

In 2018, Lemann said he felt like a “frightened dinosaur” trying to keep up with digital changes. Since then, he’s been forced to modify his long-held management style, which was based more on cost-cutting than brand-building. With a fortune estimated at $19.2 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Lemann has also become a tech investor, buying stakes in three “unicorns” founded by Brazilians: StoneCo, credit-card issuer Brex and Movile, a holding company for apps.

Lemann also attributes the rising number of tech startups in Brazil to SoftBank Group Corp.’s Latin America foray, a multibillion-dollar deal spree that minted a wave of “unicorns.” The Japanese technology giant launched a Latin America-focused fund in March 2019 that’s given “a tremendous boost to young entrepreneurs,“ he said.

Brazilian startups attracted $1.4 billion in investments this year through August, after a record $3.2 billion last year, according to data from Distrito Dataminer, a consultancy. Recent transactions include SoftBank and General Atlantic investing $107 million in Acesso Digital, a facial biometrics firm, and a $120 million round by Vulcan Capital that valued game developer Wildlife Studios at $3 billion.

Pedro Moreira Salles, who joined Lemann on the webcast, shared his enthusiasm with tech, but with one caveat: If Brazil is unable to keep its fiscal accounts under control and interest rates surge, the startup environment could be jeopardized, he said.

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