Mobile banking ... without the bank
Waleteros targets millions without traditional accounts. Top solid-state drives: It’s upgrade time
Company: Waleteros Headquarters: Venture Hive in downtown Miami.
Concept: Waleteros, the mobile banking app for the underbanked, offers a way for the more than 60 million people in the U.S. who don’t use or have a bank account to use their smartphones as their banking solution.
Story: When Etienne Gillard moved to Waleteros2he U.S. from Spain two years ago, he realized that millions of people in this country don’t use or have a bank account. In order to meet their financial needs, they rely on alternative solutions such as checkcashing stores that are time-consuming, extremely expensive and quite unsafe. Together with two friends with complementary professional experience, they decided to develop a mobile wallet solution that is cheaper, safer and more convenient than any other alternative, said Gillard, Waleteros’ CEO, who previously co-founded a language training company.
After completing a shor t re gi stration via the app, users receive a Prepaid Debit MasterCard with no monthly maintenance, minimum balance or overdraft fees. The c ard c an be used to make purchases in stores domestic ally and internationally, online, and to withdraw money from a net work of thousands of surcharge free ATMs. Through the app, users c an keep track of their transac tions and send money inst antly to other users for a small f ee.
Waleteros, part of
Solid-state drives (SSDs) are no longer too expensive. With the top 1TB capacity going for between $350 and $450, they are much more accessible and totally worth the investment. Here are the top models that won’t steer you wrong.
SanDisk Extreme Pro SSD
CNET rating: 4.5 stars out of 5 (Outstanding)
The good: The SanDisk Extreme Pro SSD has top performance and the longest warranty to date. It’s priced competitively too.
The bad: The drive the 2014 Venture Hive Miami Accelerator class, launched its app on Google Play recently. It plans to roll out an iOS version soon.
“We are Latinos living in the U.S. and we wanted to find a way to send money for less than $10. And guess what? We did much better than that! Thanks to Waleteros, now anyone, regardless of whether you have a bank account or not, can send money anytime anywhere for only 75 cents,” Gillard said. Founded: Management team: Co-founders Etienne Gillard and Sergio Carrera; Antonio Talledo, business development manager.
Number of employees: Six.
Website: www. waleteros.com
Financing: In March 2015, Waleteros closed doesn’t support self-encryption.
The cost: $219.99 to $270.99 (480GB)
The bottom line: Power users and gamers should look no further than the SanDisk Extreme Pro to get the best performance out of their home computer.
Samsung SSD 850 Pro
CNET rating: 4.5 stars out of 5 (Outstanding)
The good: The Samsung SSD 850 Pro has fast performance, high endurance — you can write a lot of data to it before it becomes unreliable — and its 2TB model is the largest on the market. The drive comes with a lot of useful features, including encryption, and a great performance-boosting mode called Rapid.
The bad: The drive is expensive compared with competing solid-state drives. The Samsung Magician software only works with Windows.
The cost: $245.00 to $259.99 (512GB)
The bottom line: The Samsung SSD 850 Pro is one of the best standard consumer-grade solid-state drives on the market, but there are cheaper alternatives with similar performance.
Samsung SSD 850 Evo
CNET rating: 4.5 stars out of 5 (Outstanding)
The good: The Samsung SSD 850 Evo delivers great performance a $600,000 seed round with angel investors from AGP Miami and others. The team plans to raise a Series A in 2016.
Recent milestones reached: Went live with app on Google Play on June 18; Partners with more than 100 independent cellphone dealers in Miami that are distributing Waleteros services. Raised $600,000 seed round. Upgraded its direct deposit solution allowing users to receive their payroll up to two days earlier than usual.
Biggest startup challenge: “Our biggest challenge is to be good at pushing the viral marketing snowball,” Gillard said. Goal: “1,000 happy early adopters!”
Next step: Running promotional campaigns in cellphone stores, taking part in events where potential users with useful features, at an affordable price. The drive is available with up to 2TB of storage space.
The bad: The drive carries a five-year warranty instead of the 10 years the Pro model offers. The Samsung Magician software only works with Windows.
The cost: $162.16 to $179.99 (500GB)
The bottom line: The Samsung 850 Evo has the best combination of performance, cost and capac- are gathering and being proactive on social networks.
Investor/advisor’s view: Thomas “Tigre” Wenrich was paired with Waleteros founders during the 2014 Venture Hive accelerator because of his prior experience owning a chain of brickand-mortar checkcashing stores. Over the following four months as a mentor, he said he became very impressed with the team’s experience and product, and at the end of the program offered to participate alongside them as a founding investor.
“They have done a great job bootstrapping — which is important because the process from idea to launch has been an 18-month ride,” Wenrich said. “They have some innovative distribution channels to get the app in front of the people who need it, but it will take some time to build momentum. They are targeting a population that has a high penetration of smartphones, but it isn’t a group that is used to transacting online. Check-cashing store customers are generally very loyal customers, and the two biggest drivers of their decisionmaking are convenience and trust. Waleteros offers convenience in spades, but they will have to work on developing the trust of consumers.
“They need to find channels that already have consumer trust, where it will be easier to introduce them to this new and better concept for managing their money. That is the idea of partnering with independent cellphone dealers, and they have several other complementary channels that they will be testing soon. Once they gain critical mass, this should really take off.” ity, making it the ideal drive for any home user.
Transcend SSD370S
CNET rating: 4 stars out of 5 (Excellent)
The good: The Transcend SSD370S delivers fast performance at low cost, has high durability and features data encryption.
The bad: The threeyear guarantee is short compared to the fiveto 10-year warranties of competing drives.
The cost: $175.99 to $193.58 (512GB)
The bottom line: The Transcend SSD370S is an affordable and satisfying upgrade for any computer that still runs on a hard drive.