Who I am and why I'm building in public now

I'm Carlos Gotlib. If you got here from a video or a random post, this is the context you're missing.

This isn't a résumé. It's the list of decisions that got me here, what went wrong in each one, and what I took from it. Every company has its own full post; this is the short version, in order.

2015: SpeakOn, the #1 app that couldn't handle its users

SpeakOn was a messaging app that translated in real time across more than 60 languages. You wrote in Spanish and the other person read it in theirs.

In June 2015 it hit #1 among free apps on the App Store in Mexico, above WhatsApp and Facebook. 200,000 users in 48 hours and 350,000 sign-ups total.

And that's exactly what killed it. The app couldn't handle the load, and fixing it meant rebuilding it from scratch.

The decision that killed it came before the success: I outsourced development without anyone on my side who understood how it was being built. When the traffic hit, I had no way of knowing what was wrong or how much it would cost to fix.

What I took from it: if you don't understand how your product is built, you don't control your company.

The full story: SpeakOn: the app that hit #1 on the App Store and why it died. And on the development side: What I learned from outsourcing the development of my first app.

2016: I start investing

I applied to Y Combinator with SpeakOn. They rejected me after the first interview. Something I didn't expect came out of it: I started connecting with the YC community and investing in its companies.

Since then I've invested in 32 startups, 27 of them from Y Combinator, with checks of around 25 thousand dollars. Today 17 are still alive, 14 have shut down, and one had an exit: Plerk, acquired by minu. That exit was paid in minu stock, not cash.

What I took from it: almost half don't make it, even with the best accelerator in the world behind them. Watching other founders win and lose from the outside is half of my judgment.

The details: 32 startup investments: what the 14 that shut down taught me. The full portfolio is in Investments.

2019: WeHelp, which later became Donna

WeHelp was a personal safety app: an SOS button that alerted your contacts, and later a call center and monitored trips. In January 2019 it hit #1 among free apps on the App Store. Again.

It grew to 700,000 registered users. In 2022 we added physical security and a call center. Most of the people using it were women, so in 2023 we focused only on them and renamed it Donna.

It was never profitable. Everyone wanted the app; almost no one wanted to pay what it cost to run.

What I took from it: people using something doesn't mean they'll pay for it. Users aren't a business.

The story: Donna: 700,000 users and it never made money and Why people don't pay for safety apps.

2019: Kimik, the product the market didn't want

In November 2019 I started Kimik: buying ads on 2,500 outdoor screens in minutes, the way you buy an ad on Facebook. We used geolocation to measure who passed in front of the screen and whether they visited the store or downloaded the app in the next 7 to 30 days.

We sold a million dollars in the first six months. And we shut down in 2021.

The product worked. The problem was the market: a handful of companies control the screens in Mexico, and they make more selling by the month than through programmatic. They had no reason to change.

What I took from it: a product that works doesn't survive a market that doesn't want it. Before you build, look at who controls distribution and whether your existence is good for them.

The story: Kimik: a million dollars in 6 months and we still shut down and Why programmatic outdoor advertising isn't taking off in Mexico.

2024: TurboCar, my first acquisition

In July 2024 I paid 160 thousand dollars for a shop in Miami that bought wrecked cars at Copart and IAAI auctions, repaired them, and sold them.

The shop had no processes, and learning to run it cost me months of losses. I switched it to luxury cars and profit per car went from around a thousand dollars to about 15 thousand. We sold 2.5 million dollars.

I still lost money. Insurers started marking cars as destruction-only or parts-only, the repairable inventory dried up, and the business never recovered what I lost while learning. I shut it down in March 2026. It was one of my worst decisions.

What I took from it: a rule. I don't buy a business in the US with less than a million dollars a year in EBITDA. Below that, you're buying a job, not a business.

The story: TurboCar: my first acquisition and why I shut it down.

The pattern

When I put it all together, there's one mistake that keeps repeating, and it's not technical.

I was the guy who did everything really fast. I'd get an idea and want to do it that same week. I have tons of ideas, and that worked against me: too many things at once, my attention split, nothing with the depth it needed.

That's why this time I'm doing the opposite. I've spent four or five months choosing my second company before starting anything. It feels unnatural, and that's exactly the point.

And there's something else I learned: nothing is worse than a company that doesn't die but doesn't grow much either. I'd rather have a company that doesn't sell than one that sells just enough to keep me hooked but never really takes off. When it doesn't sell, it forces you to shut it down and move on.

What I'm building today

Two things:

• Braid & Berry: challah sandwiches in San Diego. It starts with events and small parties, then a cart, and only after that a storefront. So far I've tested 4 recipes at home and 2 passed.
• The second company: I'm choosing it in public. I started with 112 ideas and there are 7 left.

Both, with their numbers, are in The two companies I'm building (and how I'm choosing the second one).

Why in public

Everything above I wrote after the fact. I already knew how each story ended, and that makes it easy to make sense of everything.

This time I'm sharing it as it happens: every decision with its date, every number, every test that failed. Without knowing yet if it'll work out.

And sharing it this way forces me to do what's been hardest for me: say what I'm going to do and when, and then show whether I did it. If I get scattered again, it'll be on the record.

How it works, and what I share and what I don't, is in What you'll see here.