How ‘care’ brought a Filipina-led company to New York Stock Exchange
Many Filipinos know how to be successful in business, some even can make it global, but what does it actually take for a homegrown Filipina to set up a business in the Empire State and made it to one of the world's leading financial markets?
For Sheila Marcelo, founder and chief executive officer of Care.com, caring is what it takes.
Listed in New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), Care.com is an online marketplace for personal care services headquartered in Waltham, Massachusetts. It helps families find child care, senior care, special needs care, tutoring, pet care, and housekeeping through a consumer matching solutions.
Marcelo established the company in 2006 and has raised US$111 million in venture funding from several firms, including Matrix Partners and Trinity Ventures.
By listing in NYSE, Care.com raised additional US$91 million in 2014.
“It was a hard ride as an entrepreneur,” Marcelo said, speaking before Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders and chief executive officer during the APEC CEO Summit held last week in Makati.
“Even though I have raised that much money, it’s still a challenge for me as a female entrepreneur. In the United States, I talked to 99 percent of our investors, which are men. It is very difficult. Less than 2.7 percent are female CEOs that take the company public. It is not easy task,” she added.
Care.com's global footprint began to expand in 2012 when it launched in the UK and Canada, followed by its acquisition of Berlin-based Besser Betreut, the largest online care portal in Europe. The company is now present in 16 countries.
In one of the sessions of the summit, Marcelo described Care as an "economic imperative," an aspect in the society where there’s a huge business opportunity.
“Why do I call it an economic imperative? Because today, in the US alone, US$280 billion is spent on child and senior care. It’s only in the US, it’s not even global. Second issue, it’s often the most expensive item now for dual income families in the US, it’s actually higher than home and mortgage, it’s more expensive, even more expensive than transportation or college,” Marcelo said.
“So if you ever wonder if it’s [care] a soft issue, it’s not. It’s full of love but it’s an economic imperative... We have a soaring senior care crisis that is upon us and this is no joke. Today 50 percent of those in the US in their 40s and 50s are already part of the sandwiched generation. Over the age of 65, one out of nine will die of Alzheimer’s and over 85 and we are aging and getting older because of healthcare and technology,” she added.
According to her, the world does not only have a growing demand problem in terms of personal healthcare, it also has a serious supply problem.
“Now why do I care? I was born and raised here in the Philippines proudly, went to the US for college, and got pregnant at a very young age. I had to go through undergrad, grad school with my husband, and through our careers struggling with care. Fast forward, now with my younger son Adam, I begged my parents to come to the US to take care of our younger son and my father who was carrying him up the stairs fell back and had a heart attack,” Marcelo shared.
“So at 29 years old in the United States, here I am, my husband’s parents were deceased, I was working in a technology company and I was using the yellow pages to look for care, an important issue that is going to help me fulfill my dreams, fulfill my careers to go to work and I was using the yellow pages so there has to be a better solution,” she added.
Marcelo said that setting up a business is also about timing.
When asked if she could have done this in the Philippines, she only said that yes but only if she waited 10 years from 2006.
“The Philippines is now building an ecosystem of entrepreneurship and there are a lot of things we have to do around innovation. So I think, my believe is if I had done it 10 years ago [here], it would be very challenging,” she said.
She said that the problem in the Philippines then is the absence of support and the friendliness of business environment.
“So if there’s a challenge here with a lack of ecosystem and support, imagine in the United States that’s further advanced, how difficult that would be. So two challenges are eco-system and the gender issues although I’ll proudly say the Philippines has the narrowest gender gap in treating women well. They really should. Women make all the difference,” Marcelo further said.
Marcelo said that the main challenges in setting up a company revolve around perception issues, people, and passion.
She said that people should get over what other people think and expect of them and instead focus on what they really want to do.
“Prior to Care.com I was helping families save money for college, not very fun, second, try to find a job, third now trying to find care. So manage the perception issues in your life to go pursue something,” Marcelo said.
The next challenge revolves around building the workforce.
“We cannot be where we are today without the incredible team… Building companies is about the people, it is about the teams, for all SMEs and startups, you can’t do that alone. I get the honor of being able to stand up here and tell my story but it is the people behind everything we built. Every service is built by people despite technology, every product is built by people,” Marcelo specified.
Finally, Marcelo said that aspiring businessmen should always keep their passion intact.