Last month, the Argentine startup Vercel raised $ 102 million and reached a market value of more than one billion dollars, becoming the sixth Argentine unicorn. However, this is an unknown company for most Argentines that are not engaged in computer programming.
Vergel is dedicated to facilitating the work of web designers through agile and fast platforms. In a tweet, Rauch informed about the recent funding gotten by the company.
Vergel: improving front-end
According to Guillermo Rauch, the programming world has been more concerned with the back-end, with the operation. But now it is very important at a technological level what you see, that it is easy, dynamic and beautiful. It’s part of the dynamic growth of the web, and that exploded tremendously in recent years.
Vergel works for those front-end designers, to make e-commerce sites, media, and everything better. The pandemic greatly accelerated the idea that things have to look good, that sites have to load fast.
Rauch affirmed for Infobae that he wants everything to load fast, to update now. Make it easy and cute. A spirit shared for an ecosystem that has upped its tech game in the last years.
What is Vercel, the sixth Argentine unicorn?
Vercel was born five years ago and a year later it launched its Next.js project. It is an open-source platform, similar to WordPress, which today builds many of the largest sites in the world. For example, those of TikTok, Hulu, Twitch, and Ticketmaster; those of brands such as Nike, Adidas, and Marvel; a good part of the new developments of Apple, among many others. Rauch is the CEO and ideologue of the company and has two other co-founders, a Japanese and a Finn.
Today, there are 80 employees and it only has offices in San Francisco, although it has developers from all over the world. Vercel has investors of stature, such as Bedrock Capital and Accel, who participated in the last round (series C) for USD 102 million and had previously received USD 61 million in the previous investment. The last round was also joined by 8VC, Flex Capital, GGV, Latacora, Salesforce Ventures and Tiger Global.
Vercel to make programming faster and better
“It is a global company, but it has Argentine DNA. It is an Argentine unicorn. Design is key and our manager is there ”, he assures. “Today, if you want to start programming you have to start with the front-end, the design, and we are giving free tools for those who are learning. Learn to generate incredible online experiences, that’s my advice for someone starting out, ”he said.
Rauch was one of the initial investors in Auth0, the fifth Argentine unicorn to sell for $ 6.5 billion weeks ago (and now one of Auth0’s founders has graciously returned it). And he also invested in Coder House.
“I am sure that Argentines will continue to create innovative companies, I have no doubts about our talent for these things. Get in, it’s now, it’s time to program and design great things! ”.
Vercel became another example of the Latin American talent that is disrupting the tech sector, despite not being popular with the public.
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