Casdin Capital

Carao Ventures is a Costa Rica-based early-stage venture capital firm focused on seed and Series A investments in technology companies across Central America and the broader Latin American region, providing one of the few institutional sources of early-stage capital for founders building scalable digital businesses from a region that has historically been significantly underserved by venture capital. The firm is headquartered in San Jose, Costa Rica, a city that has developed into one of Central America's most significant technology hubs with a growing community of engineering talent, international technology company offices, and a maturing startup ecosystem. Carao invests from $250,000 to $1 million in companies across fintech, enterprise software, consumer internet, and digital marketplace businesses, working closely with founders on product strategy, team building, and regional market expansion as they prepare for larger international rounds from US and Latin American institutional investors. Central America has unique characteristics as a startup ecosystem: a strong engineering culture, proximity to the US market, a growing middle class, and significant gaps in financial services, logistics, and healthcare that technology can address. The original directory notes the portfolio as various Central American startups without specific company names publicly disclosed, reflecting the early-stage nature of the ecosystem and Carao's portfolio. The firm plays a foundational role in building the Central American startup ecosystem by providing first institutional checks to founders who would otherwise have to rely entirely on friends, family, and local angel networks for their initial capital.