Mistakes and risks to understand before entering Mexico.
By Iñaqui de la Peña, founder of 2122. This guide comes from my experience at Borzo, iVoy, PowWater, and earlier work in retail and telecom. It is not legal or tax advice: confirm every legal and tax point with your own specialist. We will keep adding to it.
Leaving the structure and the banking for later
During Borzo’s setup in Mexico, opening bank accounts proved more difficult than expected. Looking back, I would have aligned the entity structure, local responsibilities, and banking requirements earlier, with the relevant specialists involved from the start. Read the full story.
Assuming you already know the market
Mexico is its own market. We have seen it in traditional logistics, in sales cycles that are far longer than in other markets, and in operating models that are never plug and play. Experience in another country, or in another part of Latin America, does not replace understanding how customers, distribution, and after-sales service work here. Everything changes, so start by testing the assumptions.
Going alone, or choosing a partner without checking
Local partners can open doors, and a poor fit can close them. Decide whether you need a partner, what you need from one, and how you will evaluate the options. Protecting what you bring, such as technology and brand, should be part of that decision from the start.
Launching without a way to charge
At Borzo in 2017, we ran the platform in Mexico for more than five months without charging. That created costs for the parent company and trained operators to expect the service for free. When we began to charge, we lost about 80% of our active couriers. Billing is part of launch readiness, not something to add later.
Changing the operating model without the full picture
At iVoy, the business moved from an asset-light model to an asset-heavy one without the detailed financial analysis and the strict process that kind of change requires. It takes a great deal of financial information and operational detail: utilization, financing, maintenance, people, and contracts. Operating without that foundation puts the whole business at risk.
Underestimating the sector’s political and economic context
In the PowWater joint venture, deep research into the water sector in Mexico revealed political and economic factors that created risk and made the investors cautious, so the launch did not go ahead. Understanding a sector this deeply before committing capital is what allowed that decision to be taken with open eyes.
Not protecting the name and the code
At Borzo and iVoy, I worked in years when building software was far more complicated and expensive than it is today. Protecting the code the business depended on, and registering the brand in the right categories, mattered a great deal. A broad name like iVoy can be used in many fields, and a name that sounds like well-known product families makes that more important. Register widely, in the right countries and categories, and ask an intellectual property specialist which apply to your business.
How we work today
At 2122 we connect these decisions to your operating plan early and keep open questions visible. If you are planning your entry to Mexico, let’s talk, or read about how we approach entering Mexico.