How $100B Mercado Libre got started—& why it almost went bankrupt after 9 months. | Hernan Kazah, Co-Founder Mercado Libre

A Product Market Fit Show | Startup Podcast for Founders

How do you build a $100B business without hypergrowth or endless funding rounds? Hernan Kazah co-founded Mercado Libre, the Latin American ecommerce giant, at the peak of the dot-com bubble. But when the market crashed, funding disappeared, and competitors doubled down on spending, Mercado Libre focused relentlessly on building a rock-solid, profitable core product—ignoring pressure to chase faster growth. Hernan shares how they turned extreme constraints into a secret weapon, why getting profitable early was a game-changer, and why the biggest businesses are built by doing fewer things, better.

Why You Should Listen

• How Mercado Libre survived going bankrupt by pivoting overnight.
• Why most startups die chasing growth—and what to do instead.
• How to build unstoppable momentum by nailing one thing first.
• The simple test to know if your startup has real product-market fit.
• The one thing all $100B companies do differently.

Keywords

Mercado Libre, product market fit, Hernan Kazah, startup advice, ecommerce growth, marketplace strategy, profitability, venture capital, early-stage startups, Latin America startups

00:00:00 Intro

00:04:07 Why We Chose the eBay Model

00:08:56 The Early Hack That Got Us Our First Users

00:14:23 Raising Money at the Worst Possible Time

00:21:37 Becoming Profitable and Going Public

00:26:34 How Mercado Libre Stayed Patient While Competitors Chased Growth

00:34:05 Why We Expanded Across Latin America From Day One

00:45:11 Our Secret to Winning Against Better-Funded Competitors

00:50:04 The Most Important Advice for Early-Stage Founders

00:52:16 Why AI is Different From the Internet and Mobile Revolutions

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Chapters

1. Intro (00:00:00)

2. Why We Chose the eBay Model (00:04:07)

3. The Early Hack That Got Us Our First Users (00:08:56)

4. Raising Money at the Worst Possible Time (00:14:23)

5. Becoming Profitable and Going Public (00:21:37)

6. How Mercado Libre Stayed Patient While Competitors Chased Growth (00:26:34)

7. Why We Expanded Across Latin America From Day One (00:34:05)

8. Our Secret to Winning Against Better-Funded Competitors (00:45:11)

9. The Most Important Advice for Early-Stage Founder (00:50:04)

10. Why AI is Different From the Internet and Mobile Revolutions (00:52:16)