Pedro David Espinoza is a TEDx speaker, entrepreneur, investor, and author. In 2014, Pedro became the Founder & CEO of SmileyGo, an app that helped companies invest smarter. SmileyGo indexed the data of 1.5 million NGOs in addition to having users in 30 countries. Incubated at SkyDeck, his software startup gained funding from 1517 Fund, Frank Baxter, Jack Larson, and Berkeley Haas Seed Fund. In 2017, Janet Napolitano awarded Pedro The University of California Entrepreneur Winner. In 2018, Pedro founded Pan Peru USA, a venture that empowers women to become entrepreneurs. With the support from Fortune 500s, Pan Peru has empowered 100 female entrepreneurs. In 2019, Pedro wrote a book with Jorge Titinger with contributions from Eric Schmidt, Reed Hastings, and Dan Schulman. Pedro's book \u2013 Differences That Make A Difference \u2013 attracted 100 CEOs as contributors such as Pat Gelsinger who wrote the foreword. His book received the 2020 Best Business Book Award by Latino International.<\/p>\n
A Berkeley alumnus with certificates from Stanford and Harvard, Pedro interned as a car mechanic during high school. In 2010, Pedro launched his music singles on Apple, Spotify, and Amazon. Pedro is the Founder & General Partner of PDE Ventures, where he has 20 startup investments such as Robot.com, Mocafi and Happioh. He is also a limited partner at venture capital funds such as Cortado Ventures, GoodLight Capital, and 1Flourish Capital. In 2021, The Silicon Valley Business Journal recognized him as a Latinx Business Leadership Honoree.
\nIn 2016, Pedro became a distinguished keynote speaker. Pedro has given 300 keynotes by sharing his immigrant entrepreneurial story at companies such as Microsoft, Meta, and Google. In 2020, he became a lecturer at Tecnologico de Monterrey to teach entrepreneurship. In 2024, Pedro's second book \u2013 The Real ROI: Return on Inclusion \u2013 included contributions from 50 CEOs, such as Michael Dell, John Hennessy, and Shellye Archambeau.<\/p>\n
Pedro has been profiled in USA Today, Nasdaq, AOL, Yahoo Finance, Forbes, CGTN America, CBS, Univision, Telemundo, The Good Men Project, Poets&Quants, Hispanic Shark Tank, Stanford Daily, Berkeley Haas Magazine, Times of Israel, KRON-TV, Hispanic Executive, Latin America Reports, Al D\u00eda News, and Latino Leaders Magazine. In 2017, The Voice of America named Pedro "The Robinhood of Technology\u201d. Pedro serves on the boards of directors of Notre Dame de Namur University, CuriOdyssey, Melzi Surgical, Silicon Valley Tech Academy, ActAware, synergEV, and Institute for International Medicine.<\/p>\n
In 2017, Pedro gave his TED Talk \u2013 Build the Bridge \u2013 sharing his American Dream story having 22,000 views. In 2020, Pedro joined the Silicon Valley Leadership Group as the VP of Business Development. In 2021, Pedro was elected as the Vice Curator for Global Shapers in Palo Alto by the World Economic Forum (WEF). In 2022, Pedro got accepted to the LinkedIn Creator Accelerator Program as a Technology & Innovation Awardee having 23,600 followers. Later, he became the CMO of Ever Medical Technologies to lead the marketing team. In 2023, Pedro received the NextGen 30 Under 30 Award presented by Goldman Sachs. Later, Pedro was appointed to the Advisory Board of 1t.org of the World Economic Forum. That year, Pedro got appointed to serve on the leadership team of Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship, which is one of Stanford\u2019s largest religious groups. In 2024, Pedro received the Silicon Valley 40 Under 40 Award presented by BMO. Pedro\u2019s Pan Peru has given 10,000 children access to STEM education and reforested 15,000 trees. In 2025, Pedro joined the Young Presidents\u2019 Organization (YPO) as Vice Chairman of Espinoza Group (Autoespar, GESA, Hertz Peru). Pedro has been recognized in the Top 15 Hispanic Influencers of 2025 by HRCap. As of 2025, Pedro\u2019s books have been featured in the Berkeley Engineering, Harvard Kennedy School, and Stanford Graduate School of Business libraries. Pedro has received recognition for his success, he has received the 2021-2022 and 2022-2023 HITEC 100 Awards – which features the 100 most influential Latinos.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Pedro David Espinoza is a TEDx speaker, entrepreneur, investor, and author. In 2014, Pedro became the Founder & CEO of SmileyGo, an app that helped companies invest smarter. SmileyGo indexed the data of 1.5 million NGOs in addition to having users in 30 countries. Incubated at SkyDeck, his software startup gained funding from 1517 Fund, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-973","speaker","type-speaker","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t