Building Pagaleve: How Brazil's BNPL Leader Reached R$1B Volume & Profitability at 8x YoY Growth | Henrique Weaver (CEO & co-founder, ex-Uber, ex-OYO)

Emerging Fintech by Tony Cueva Bravo

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Building Pagaleve: How Brazil's BNPL Leader Reached R$1B Volume & Profitability at 8x YoY Growth | Henrique Weaver (CEO & co-founder, ex-Uber, ex-OYO)

Inside Pagaleve's growth engine: Building Brazil's BNPL leader with technology, talent acquisition, and strategic prioritization

Tony Cueva Bravo

Apr 28, 2025

Transcript

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Henrique Weaver is the co-founder and CEO of Pagaleve, a Brazilian fintech pioneering buy now, pay later services via Brazil's instant payment system PIX. Before founding Pagaleve, Henrique held leadership positions at global companies including Uber, OYO, and McKinsey. He recently led Pagaleve to reach over 1 billion reais in payment volume and achieve positive EBITDA while growing 8x year-over-year. In this episode, we discuss how Pagaleve is revolutionizing credit access in Brazil, the impact of payment innovation on financial inclusion, and the future of fintech in emerging markets.

In this conversation, you'll learn:

How Pagaleve serves three underserved customer groups: people without credit cards, those with insufficient credit limits, and consumers who prefer alternative payment methods
Why Pagaleve's purchasing process is faster and simpler than using a credit card online
How PIX, Brazil's instant payment system, has created new opportunities for fintech innovation
The cultural lessons Henrique brought from Uber's "big bold bets" philosophy to Pagaleve
How Pagaleve's AI-driven credit engine analyzes 100+ variables in real-time to achieve 70% approval rates with delinquency below 2%
The three key traits Henrique looks for when hiring: high energy levels, interpersonal skills, and strong analytical capabilities
How Pagaleve is testing physical retail with 2,000 locations while maintaining focus on e-commerce
The strategy behind securing a $25M Series A led by Salesforce Ventures (their first investment in Latin America)
How Pagaleve achieved positive EBITDA while maintaining 8x year-over-year growth
Practical advice for entrepreneurs building fintech solutions in emerging markets

Some takeaways:

The Brazilian market has a deeply embedded installment payment culture, but before Pagaleve, credit cards were the only scalable payment option, excluding three key customer segments: people without credit cards (30% of adults), consumers with insufficient credit limits, and those who prefer alternative payment methods.
Building a successful fintech in emerging markets requires understanding local payment culture—Brazilian consumers expect installment options for most purchases, making Pagaleve's offering a natural fit despite the presence of established players.
Real-time data and AI-driven credit assessment can dramatically improve approval rates compared to traditional methods—Pagaleve achieves 70% approval rates while traditional "crediários" only approve 15-20% of requests.
For founders recruiting top talent to startups, focus on communicating your vision for the future rather than current company size—Henrique successfully recruited executives from established companies by showcasing the long-term opportunity.
Company culture should be established early and centered around clear, actionable values—Pagaleve's five cultural norms include collaboration, authenticity, high energy, thinking big, and taking responsibility for the whole business.
When pursuing enterprise clients, prioritize delivering measurable value over marketing tactics—retailers adopt Pagaleve because they generate more revenue, not because of promotional efforts.
Innovative features that solve specific friction points can drive growth—co-payment for partial approvals and turbo approval for initially declined customers have significantly improved conversion rates for Pagaleve's merchant partners.
Prioritize ruthlessly instead of spreading resources too thin—despite having domain names for expansion across Latin America, Pagaleve remains focused exclusively on Brazil where the opportunity is large enough to build a multi-billion dollar company.
Balance process creation with maintaining agility as your company grows—Pagaleve implemented structured planning forums while being careful not to lose the speed and flexibility of a smaller operation.
For entrepreneurs building fintech solutions in emerging markets, invest significant time researching local regulations, talk to domain experts rather than just reading articles, and be conservative in regulatory compliance to avoid unexpected setbacks.

Where to find Henrique Weaver: