The Chingona Factor – Chingona Founding Partner Samara Hernandez

Chingona translates to an intelligent, fearless woman who can get things done. Founding Partner of Chingona Ventures, Samara Hernandez, is as Chingona as it gets. Samara launched Chingona in 2019, made 18 investments, and received part of a $50M investment from PayPal Ventures. She focuses on investing in overlooked, massive, and growing markets.

We talk about spotting opportunities, diversity as an accelerant to outsized returns, and why cultivating different networks improves your chances of success.

Samara was born in Mexico and came to the U.S. at a young age. Growing up in a dual-language, multicultural household, she did not pick up English as quickly as Math, which led her to pursue a skillset and a degree in Engineering at the University of Michigan. For about ten years, Samara had a career on Wall Street, in public markets at Goldman Sachs, and went on to get her MBA at Northwestern University.

Chingona Ventures focuses on massively changing industries and founders whose backgrounds uniquely position them to create businesses in growth markets that are often overlooked. Their focus areas are financial technology, female technology, food technology, health/wellness, and the future of learning.