With just weeks until Donald Trump takes office, the future of trade between the U.S. and Mexico looks deeply uncertain, as a storm of possible tariffs and border walls brews. For entrepreneurs Juan Pablo Ramos and Daniel Autrique, it’s a tempest headed straight for their startup—and they’re ready.
Since 2022, Ramos and Autrique have been taking on the tough challenge of building trust between manufacturers in the U.S. and Mexico. They’ve been using technology to build a bridge across an already-complicated business terrain, frequently marked by undelivered orders, missed payments, and broken promises.
"The trust is broken, and goes both ways," said Autrique, who cofounded Prima with Ramos and their fellow Stanford MBA Patricio Servitje. Prima, which today serves more than 200 customers, is a tech-forward manufacturing and supply chain integrator. The company was conceived with cross-border U.S.-Mexico business relationships in mind, and the startup has attracted interest and investment from a broad list of backers.
Prima raised $23 million in new Series A backing earlier this year, a few months before Trump’s election victory. The Series A included investors Acrew, Nazca, and Quona Capital. This brings Prima’s total capital raised to $42.5 million, as the company is also disclosing for the first time an additional $19.5 million in previous funding. Prima’s other investors include Box Group, Canary, Endeavor, Fluent Ventures, Greenoaks, K50 Ventures, Marathon Ventures, NXTP, and Picus Capital.
The return of Trump, who has threatened to levy heavy tariffs on both Mexico and Canada when he becomes president again next month, doesn’t change a fundamental truth, Ramos says—that we’re in the midst of a "monumental supply chain transformation."
"Governments change, tariffs shift—that’s the intrinsic reality of doing business in global supply chains," said Ramos. "Within the current landscape, the U.S. faces a shortage of qualified blue-collar labor, and rising tensions with China are driving a fundamental shift in global supply chains—one that cannot be easily swayed by political posturing."
Prima serves as a one-stop shop for Mexican manufacturers, offering financial support, engineering, technology, and end-to-end services—handling everything from lead generation to delivery and invoicing—so manufacturers can focus on production. Ramos and Autrique told me that they were thrilled and a touch intimidated back when they received their very first purchase order for $8,000. There’s since been a lot of distance traveled. When I spoke to them, their most recent order was from a Minnesota mining company for $4 million.
Ramos and Autrique also speak candidly about an essential truth—that the strongest relationships with customers aren’t forged when things are perfect, but when the going gets tough.
"We're building trust," said Autrique. "Of course, we make mistakes. Manufacturing is hard, and that’s what happens to everyone in the industry…I think what’s really differentiated us with our U.S. customers is the way we deal with mistakes. Some of our top customers today, the relationship started with a mistake."
Rudy Bambic, CEO at original equipment manufacturer Electro-Tech, confirms this.
"The very first order they did, a couple measurements were off, minor stuff," Bambic told Fortune. "This was on a Friday. These guys got on a plane, I had dinner with them on Sunday, and they were in my building in Hammond, Indiana on Monday morning."
Ramos and Autrique are refreshingly candid about the challenges of being founders. They speak frankly about challenges with early partners, demand volatility, and the process of building their now-75-person team. (Ramos said that "finding the diamonds-in-the-rough, people willing to take a risk working with a scrappy, early-stage startup has been a humbling experience.") And even with all their combined experience and context, they have been floored by the level of work to be done—and the level of potential.
"We’re building a business model that can serve this market in a differentiated manner, that tackles the pain points," said Ramos. "And those pain points are significantly more acute than we ever expected because informality in Mexico is so rampant. But at the same time, the opportunity is so massive."
The outcome of Trump’s tariff declaration remains unclear, and it could be a bumpy geopolitical ride ahead for Prima and its customers. But with only about a 2,000-mile shared border between the U.S. and Mexico, the promise is clear. And Ramos and Autrique could be onto something. Because trust isn’t built when things are easy, but when they’re hard.
ICYMI…My colleagues Jessica Mathews and Leo Schwartz scooped the news that fintech unicorn Stash laid off 40% of its workforce. Read more here.
See you tomorrow,
Allie Garfinkle
Twitter: @agarfinks
Email: alexandra.garfinkle@fortune.com
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Correction, Dec. 6, 2024: The email version of this article referenced the air travel space between the U.S. and Mexico. It has been updated to instead reflect the shared border for clarity.
