LITS ebusiness started in the basement of David Bernardo, its CEO, in 2013 in Mexico City. Today it has a presence in three countries, 55 employees and invoices $135 million a year. His team’s experience has allowed him to design projects for brands such as Walmart, Amazon, Steren, El Palacio de Hierro, Weber Grills, airlines, insurance companies, ecommerce and fintech startups. Cityfori, a tourist smart city platform, is its most precious jewel: an intuitive solution for travelers that will be implemented, initially, in Lisbon, Portugal. It will personalize cities in real time for each tourist. It uses artificial intelligence and machine learning with technologies such as IBM’s Watson and Google Tensor Flow. It will be presented next November.
ENTREPRENEURS
David Bernardo has 17 years of experience in ebusiness, holding management and strategic positions in Europe and Latin America. Joao Alves worked in energy companies and e-commerce in three countries. Hazael Ramirez started in digital marketing at a young age and was SEO director for Linio. Susana Welsh was project manager in Lisbon and digital marketing director for net a porter Girissima.
PROBLEM
Mexico is not competitive in terms of innovation, much less in terms of technology. As a result, several of the largest companies have disappeared since 2000
SOLUTION
Infer the digital gene to the business model of its clients and train new generations of professionals in the technological paradigms of the Internet.
STRATEGY AND BUSINESS MODEL
It has six business divisions (consulting, education, executive search, B2B services, venture incubation/acceleration and smart city development) that operate under one axiom: revenue before costs. “I don’t understand why fundraising is celebrated more than profitability,” says David, given that he and his partners broke even in the third month of self-funded operations. Their relationship with their clients is ironclad because they immerse themselves in the companies they work with to merge digital with traditional business.
To train in ebusiness and ecommerce, they launched Ebusiness Academy, a school focused on digital professionalization in Mexico and Europe. It educates 350 people a year in a sector that needs more than 5,000 professionals. It has an initiative to support underprivileged young people to educate them in programming and get them jobs. In 2014, the Financial Times considered it one of the most outstanding in its field.
EXPERT OPINION
Susie Sedlacek, an executive at Silicon Valley-based consultancy 2hrv – she previously served as a director at Magento – believes that LITS ebusiness’ competitive advantage lies with its founders. “David not only has the knowledge, but also the guts to innovate.”
