About

I’m Rapha Dayan. I spent 17 years in data and technology building teams at some of Latin America’s biggest tech companies, including Mercado Libre, PicPay, SumUp, and several Rocket Internet ventures.

Along the way I started internet businesses of my own and exited two of them. In 2024 I walked away from the corporate ladder for good: now I build my own products full time, and every one of them is on the front page with its real traffic and MRR.

• 
  Jan 2026 - Present
  Board Member
  Gama Ensino

  Board Member at Gama, supporting the technology strategy and growth of two edtech companies. I advise leadership on technology, product development, engineering, and innovation, with a focus on scaling technology operations, reducing costs, creating new revenue opportunities, and building products that drive business growth. This is a non-executive board role.

• 
  Apr 2024 - Present
  Founder
  BuiltByRapha

  Left the corporate world to build internet businesses full time. Building a solopreneur portfolio in public, launching products, sharing what I learn, and experimenting along the way.

• 
  Mar 2024 - Present
  Co-founder
  Baobá

  Co-founded Baobá, a fintech specializing in automated quantitative investment strategies powered by artificial intelligence. The company develops proprietary algorithms and technology to automate investment decisions, combining advanced statistical models, robust data infrastructure, and systematic research to identify and capitalize on opportunities in the capital markets. Its approach is built around efficiency, scalability, and disciplined, data-driven execution, with the goal of reducing human dependency and continuously improving investment performance.

• 
  Jul 2021 - Mar 2024
  Executive Director, Data
  PicPay

  Led data at PicPay, the Brazilian fintech that went public in 2026 and serves 80M+ customers. I unified 21 data teams into a single 200+ person organization and designed the company-wide strategy, roadmap, and career framework across Analytics Engineering, Data Analytics, Data Governance, and Data Science. The redesign cut staff turnover by 60% in six months and lifted eNPS by 40%. On the money side: USD 4M in new revenue from customer profiling and churn management, USD 16M saved through transaction reconciliation and chargeback management, plus USD 4M more from FinOps. My team was a finalist for Databricks’ global Data Team Disruptor Award, and I spoke at the Databricks Data & AI Summit 2022.

  Databricks Award finalists PicPay case study (Databricks) Census: 2022 data conferences Talk: PicPay data platform (YouTube)
• 
  Apr 2022 - Apr 2023
  Director, Data
  Coderhouse

  Directed the Data vertical at one of Latin America’s largest edtechs. I led the full review of the Data curriculum portfolio for a learner base of 500k+ students, refreshing course structure, market alignment, and content quality across the whole vertical.

• M
  Aug 2020 - Mar 2022
  Chief Data Officer
  Moetá

  My brother’s startup: four years of hard lessons, later discontinued. I owned the data engineering architecture, KPI design for projects and sales, and GeoAI initiatives to improve reforestation processes. The growth campaigns I led increased social media sales by 160% and followers by 320%, and I also oversaw the website’s front end and back end development.

• 
  May 2018 - Jun 2021
  Manager, Analytics & Data Science
  Mercado Libre

  Ran analytics and data science for Mercado Pago at Mercado Libre, Latin America’s most valuable company. I built and led a 100+ person regional team across four countries, defined the end-to-end analytics and data science strategy for the region, and owned the product insight lifecycle for MPOS, merchant services, cards, and wallet products. The team generated USD 60M in revenue through customer profiling, lifecycle management, and churn initiatives, improved fraud alert precision by 82% while freeing 35 analyst hours a week, recovered USD 8M via transaction reconciliation, and saved USD 4M a year through MDR renegotiation. Three consecutive years with the region’s highest management eNPS (98/100) and roughly 1% turnover.

  Podcast: inside Mercado Pago’s data team (Spotify)
• 
  Apr 2016 - May 2018
  Manager, Business Intelligence
  SumUp

  BI plus risk and fraud through fintech hypergrowth. I managed 20+ people globally, oversaw 500+ recurring ETL jobs feeding reports and predictive models, and rolled out self-service analytics that increased analytical adoption by 60%. Through the payleven merger I integrated teams and processes while keeping net loss below 0.08%, and redesigned the reporting standards and KPI frameworks across the merged operations.

• 
  Oct 2013 - Jul 2016
  Manager, Risk & Fraud / BI
  payleven

  Four promotions in three years, from finance analyst to manager, in Rocket Internet’s card payments venture that later merged with SumUp. I built the local risk and BI operations from scratch: transaction monitoring, disputes, compliance, and executive reporting. R-based fraud profiling cut cash burn by more than 40%, Tableau and Talend automated the reporting, and the onboarding SLA dropped from 14 minutes to 3. In the earlier finance roles I led treasury, settlement, chargeback, refund, P&L, and board reporting.

• 
  Oct 2012 - Sep 2013
  Assistant, Strategy
  GLOSSYBOX

  First startup job, straight into the Rocket Internet school of execution. I built stakeholder feedback campaigns and statistical analyses for beauty brands and operations, secured 10k+ free products, produced 50+ feedback presentations, and found operational opportunities that cut shipment costs by 8%.

• JT
  Jan 2009 - Sep 2012
  Assistant, Finance
  JT Electrical Engineering

  Where it all started.