How a Venture Studio Transformed the DNA of a Traditional Company

In a region of the Andean highlands, a company with more than three decades of history was at a turning point. Its business model, based on the distribution of an essential product for households and small businesses, had been solid for years. However, changing energy dynamics, the emergence of new technologies and pressure to serve underserved segments were beginning to demand more than operational efficiency. It was time to evolve.

The company's strategic committee knew it had to go beyond its core. There was a latent opportunity: its customers — mostly microentrepreneurs, families in the base of pyramids and small merchants — did not just need access to energy. They needed access to financial services, education, technology, and credit to grow. In fact, many of them were trapped in informal financing schemes, paying daily interest to loan sharks, with no credit history and no real possibility of making progress.

The idea of creating a Corporate Venture Studio, an independent unit, but deeply connected to the purpose and strategic assets of the parent company, was born. This decision was more than an experiment: It was a structural bet to reinvent the growth model, transform the organizational culture and generate economic and social impact at the same time.

Phase I: The Venture Studio's Strategic Engine

The Venture Studio was formed under a clear thesis: to incubate new businesses leveraged on the parent company's customer base, but oriented to solve structural problems through technology, strategic alliances, and scalable business models.

The first step was to map the extended value chain: from contact with households and microentrepreneurs to the identification of their income flows, payment methods, use of complementary products and unresolved needs. Based on this analysis, three strategic focuses were defined:

1. Financial Services: Creation of a fintech that would make it possible to offer microcredits, programmed savings, and digital payments with traceability.

2. Digital Distribution: Design of a marketplace for essential products that could be financed through credit or rent-to-own.

3. Just Energy Transition: Development of products and services that facilitate access to cleaner and more efficient energy technologies.

Phase II: Design an MVP That Works in the Real World

Unlike traditional incubators, the Venture Studio had a key advantage: direct access to a real customer base, existing distribution channels, and historical consumption data. This allowed the definition of a highly focused Minimum Viable Product (MVP): offering microloans to finance small appliances, home improvements, or working capital for shopkeepers.

The product was initially launched through physical service centers (known as “solution centers”), where key hypotheses were validated:

- How relevant was consumer history as a proxy for credit risk?

- Which non-financial variables best predicted payment probability?

- What kind of incentives moved the client to use formal credit for the first time?

Each experiment was rigorously measured. Validation was not only financial, but also operational and cultural: did the client understand the product, was the experience dignified and respectful, and did the operational team balance scale and proximity.

Phase III: Partnerships to Scale Impact

One of the keys to the model was to create an ecosystem of partners from the beginning. Rather than trying to develop everything in-house, the studio formed alliances with credit funders, MSME insurers, technology developers, universities, and appliance suppliers. This approach did three things:

1. Significantly reduce risk and development time.

2. Access data analytics and machine learning capabilities to build a hybrid risk engine (combining traditional and alternative methods).

3. Prepare the model to be nationally scalable, even outside the original core of the company.

A traditional fintech would have taken years to build these relationships or gain credibility to operate. The Venture Studio, on the other hand, functioned as a reliable bridge between the corporate world, the innovation ecosystem, and local communities.

Phase IV: Preparing for External Capital

Once the model demonstrated operational viability, positive unit profitability, and a good quality portfolio, a structured process was prepared to attract capital. But this was not just any type of investment.

The Venture Studio team understood that the nature of the product required specialized, non-dilutive debt funding, preferably with a focus on impact or financial inclusion. A robust commercial proposal was developed, including:

- Accounting and legal due diligence.

- Five-year financial models with risk sensitivity.

- Portfolio growth and risk-adjusted profitability projections.

- Risk mitigation strategies and recovery models.

With this information, debt funds, development banks, and impact funds with an appetite for hybrid fintech models were contacted. The results were immediate: several investors expressed interest in funding growth with structured and subordinated lines of credit.

Phase V: Expansion, Spin-offs and New Ventures

The success of the first product generated two key consequences:

1. A replicable model was created to develop new startups within the studio, each with a validated MVP, its own financing structure, and the possibility of becoming independent spin-offs.

2. The mindset of innovation and co-creation began to permeate the culture of the parent company, which went from being a traditional company to an impact platform with a 10-year vision.

The Venture Studio not only helped grow the financial business, it helped reposition the parent brand as an ally of regional development, committed to the well-being of its communities, but also with a sustainable and scalable business logic.

Final Reflections

This case demonstrates that a well-structured Venture Studio can be the transforming engine of a traditional company. It is neither a think tank nor a cost center: it is a venture factory that uses the power of an established core to scale new solutions to urgent problems.

But it also makes clear that the success of a studio does not depend on capital alone, nor on brilliant ideas. It depends on:

- Having real strategic tension that motivates transformation.

- Designing tests with real clients and not in laboratories.

- Incorporating allies from day one.

- Make impact a tangible objective, not just a speech.

Where others saw limits, this Venture Studio saw a fertile field to sow innovation. And what started as a pilot with small credits, ended up becoming a network of companies that build progress from the grassroots.