Cuantix

We are a cloud-based software that helps organizations and capital allocators better understand, value, and manage social and environmental impact. This, to satisfy the increasing demand for reportability and transparency of all organizations around the world, with the great pressures of climate and social change.

Cuantix covers all the process of impact measurement, from designing a measurement plan, selecting the right indicators, gathering data from the source, analyzing the data and effectively communicating the results.

In under 2 years we have worked with +50 clients in 9 countries, helping them understand better their non-financial indicators and improve their impact initiatives. We have trained more than 600 organizations on impact measurement, improve capital raising opportunities for 30% of our clients and helped 50% improve their programs based on data, and provided understanding on more than 250M USD invested funds, which all translates into bigger and better impact for more beneficiaries.

Evidence about how much difference an organization makes in society is now required. However, demonstrating with data how enterprises, NGOs and government programs create a positive impact and change people’s lives is quite a challenge. The measuring process, from the design (what to measure), data collection, and analysis, is costly and time-consuming, but necessary in every successful organization. Impact data generates value, however, over 68% of organizations in Latin America DO NOT quantify their impact. The organizations that actually do, do not use standardized indicators, their process and results are hard to find, making it difficult for the ecosystem to improve itself by sharing best practices and use past experiences and methods as stepping points to generate more effective programs. Finally, the lack of measurement brings disincentive to social investments and a higher probability of failure of all social initiatives. 

We aim to reduce the failure rate of social initiatives and give a powerful tool to those organizations that are creating the greatest impact so they can grow and raise more funds.

We serve different types of profile clients: NGOs, Corporations, Impact Investors and Governments, providing the same result, to measure the impact of their social initiatives. NGOs are our greater number of clients, with more than 55% being of this kind. 

We work closely with all our clients. Our first step for each project is to design a measurement plan for the program, and we do this by providing online consultants and automated frameworks that help our clients better understand their desired impact. This allows us to help them select the right indicators and make the necessary adjustments to best implement the project. 

Our online consultants provide support for the project during the whole implementation, from design to data collection and creating impact reports, which creates synergy with our clients and ensures quality in the measurement. 

For impact investors we are leading the AMI initiative, an alliance with more than 20 Latam organizations to help understand the challenges for impact investment in the region and to develop the ecosystem. We are gathering data and collecting insight directly through interviews with investors and entrepreneurs, which serve to improve our solution for this segment.

Cuantix is an impact evaluation software. We provide the right mixture between technology and online support for organizations (corporations, governments, investors, NGOs) to measure and communicate their impact data 10X faster and 5X cheaper than traditional methods. 

Cuantix possesses a database of +1000 indicators and frameworks to help projects measure their impact. The platform facilitates the match of the right indicators to each project based on previous studies, expedites the measurement, and suggests questions and types of surveys to deploy. The design measurement process gets completed with automated data collection tools such as Facebook and WhatsApp bots, automatic and easy-to-understand reports that facilitate the communication of their impact to their stakeholders. 

Cuantix not only measures the social impact of projects and organizations but also the returns of investment they generate and soon will provide environmental and ESG measurement processes that will make Cuantix THE triple impact measurement solution. Solving how companies get measured will provide a completely new understanding of the role companies have in society, helping governments, investors, employees, and customers make the right decisions regarding which organizations and programs create most value and deeper impact.

The measurement of environmental and social areas has remained for many years under the academic umbrella, and although there are already some measurement standards such as IRIS from GIIN, all the SDGs goals (which are only half used), they all face the unsolved problem of: where do you get the impact data from? No one is solving this little big problem. Based on this, our natural substitutes are consultants or own made measurements (excel, online surveys). But the information that comes out of those is not structured nor comparable.

In Cuantix, we begin to measure directly where the impact is generated: people, environment or processes, in different ways, with different technologies. That's why we understand that the solution does not come by imposing a standard (one-fits-all) but instead, having customized measurement process according to your own characteristics, that takes the process from design to data collection, results, and data comparison to determine whether you are successful or not, but it's only possible using large amounts of data and technology (which we are building).

Our innovation comes from: 1. Classifying socio- environmental data in a structured way, 2. Incorporate knowledge from previous studies or data to suggest methodologies and indicators to implement, 3. Reducing the cost of data collection through automated processes and digital channels. 4. Packaging this in easy-to-use software.

Our main goal is to help solve two big scope problems: capital and processes efficiencies. 

Capital efficiency so that investment is made in the projects with more impact to be achieved. We part from the scope that there is not enough structured data about impact or standardized frameworks to achieve comparable data, which in turn decreases the effectiveness of our investments in creating true impact. 

Process efficiency because impact measurement usually requires specialized personal and data collection processes that makes it extremely expensive for most organizations. By automating processes, digitizing data collection and providing remote support, we are lowering the barriers for more organizations to measure, collecting more data and making it comparable for new projects to develop from past experiences, which improves the effectiveness of impact programs for beneficiaries. 

Although we are still young, we use 5 metrics to measure our impact: 1. Number of organizations that measure (50 org), Capital invested in measured projects (250M $), Project failure rate (0%), Org that made decisions with Measurement results (50%) and project replicability (20%). We plan on expanding these metrics over time.

Since 2019 we have worked with +50 organizations, from NGOs to corporations and Government. By helping these organizations we have collected direct data from over 2500 enterprises and +7000 direct beneficiaries. We have also helped train over 600 organizations on impact measurement. 

We estimate that in five years, our reach will be far greater, with over 400 clients served, helped gather data from over 7K organizations and +50K beneficiaries from our clients and trained over 5000 organizations on impact measurement. 

2020:

• Reach 400K in sales for 2020

• Reach 60 new clients and 15000 beneficiaries 

• 1000 total trained organizations

• Tend to clients in 10 Latam countries

• Raise our first 500K in private financing

Over the next years we want to develop our platform even further, incorporating modules of machine learning that help predict the correct indicators for a project to measure without the help of a consultant. These automations, the new modules such as ESG and Impact Due Diligence,  together with the strategic alliances we are implementing in the region will help us increase our reach in the coming years and replicate the platform for even more organizations. 

We have also realized that our platform, with minor adjustments, could help measure not only health symptoms and status of Covid but also the economic and mental state of large populations. We are currently proposing this solution, and if it gets funded, we would be able to collect data from millions of latam population, helping governments and organizations create better assistance plans, public policies and incentives for the whole region.

1. Corona virus has changed the world, and we fear the economic impact it will have on startups and small businesses like us. We need to review our projections and make sure we have the funds to keep the team afloat during these uncertain times. 

2. We were aiming to make our first investment round this year, but we do not know how investors will behave with current high risks. 

Five years:

1. Low level of knowledge in impact measurement value: in most corporate enterprises, they are not aware that their social programs can actually be linked with their business and by measuring them, they can actually generate value to their stakeholders and improve the sustainability of their business. 

2. Impact evaluation requires time: impact initiatives are long term and so we have to wait until that change occurs. This limits the frequency the client logs in to the platform.

To tackle our challenges we are: 

1. Looking actively for alternatives financing methods such as grants, loans and government subsidies. 

2. Creating webinars and workshops that educate organizations on the high return of impact measurement.

3. Broadening our indicators to include ESG metrics, which is a more mature market to date and allows us to have a more robust value proposition, allowing organizations to measure themselves from the more basic to more complex frameworks.  

4. Developing new features that allow the full management of projects, which is helping us improve retention, incorporate data from outside sources and soon we will implement machine learning capabilities that will help provide automated and personalized guidance to our clients.

We launched to market in July 2018, and that year sales closed in 60K. Since then we have reached 300.000 USD in total sales and we have 200.000 USD in the pipeline, with + 50 Clients in 9 Latam countries such as Google, KPMG, Conmebol, Corfo and Banesco. 

Full time: 10

Part time: 2

Freelance consultants: 12 (they are certified Cuantix consultants, but are in charge of specific projects depending on client’s profile and needs)

Adriana has spent a lot of time getting to know, observing and recruiting exceptional people to join the team. They are:

In Tech development: Rafael, Natalia and Sergio assemble a great set of skills with more than 32 years of experience combined and background developing software in areas such as banking, social networks, and fortune 500 companies.

In Core Business-Experience: Adriana leads the team with 15 years of experience developing impact measurement projects in 8 LATAM countries working for multilateral organizations such as IDB and CAF. From there she has known providers, academics, that help me grow the business internationally and validate the quality of what we do. Alejandro, A specialist in big data and Data Analytics.

Business Development: Hugo is an expert in CSR and after many years, he has just sold his company, he provides a great network of contacts. Javier has years of experience in business consulting, international exposure and experience raising companies

We have 3 signed partnerships in Mexico to help us expand the market in 2020, one social program developer, 1 startup with big recurrent projects and one program generator, which we are hoping will bring 100K in sales in 2020. We also have commercial partners in Panamá and Chile. 

Also, we are leading an initiative called " Alianza por la Medición de Impacto" or AMI, which end goal is to develop on top of current impact standards with a latam-global vision to improve the ecosystem of impact investing in the region. So far 25 organizations have signed a commitment to join such as Corfo, 2811, ASPEN, SVX Mexico, Agora, Viva Idea, ColCapital, Bolsa Institucional de Valores Mexico, and others. This initiative will help us understand the impact investment market in the region, tweak Cuantix with new functionalities to their specific needs and provide value for the ecosystem.

For an early stage company, led by a woman, in a very particular niche that is the social impact, it is very important to have the support renown organization like MIT, Tecnológico de Monterrey and Universidad de los Andes, because it gives us a voice to tell the world how important it is what we are developing, specially in the Latam region where there is so much to be done. 

In addition, because of the focus of the application, we feel that it is an organization that communes with our same values of contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals and how data can help transform the lives of millions of people in Latam and the globe.

We are always eager to contribute to the organizations we take part in, and the network of mentors, institutions and members in general of TPrize would also be a great platform to communicate how impact can redefine the way we measure organizations.

UN Women:  I would like to provide lectures and assistance to other women entrepreneurs about my story and inspire them to understand that you can be a mom, woman and entrepreneur, all at the same time. I believe that assuming all these roles at the same time is a great challenge and I would like to contribute to be support for many other women who wish to achieve it. 

IDB Group: even tho I have worked together with IDB in the past as impact consultant, I would love to create closer bonds to help promote more efficient impact measurements to a greater number of organizations. It was while working on CAF and IDB that I understood the need for technology to accelerate and make impact measurement more efficient. Together we could create great programs for the region to improve based on data