Edson began his professional life as a musician, just like many teenagers in the eighties, but also coded and developed his games. This knowledge led him to start working with tech at his family's retail business.

He left the company for an MBA in Finance at Columbia University. He then started a five-year tenure at Lucent Technologies, reaching the position of Vice President of Sales and Business Development. In 2002 started the M&A boutique Cicerone Capital focused on Telecom, Media, and Technology; 

During this period he joins Endeavor, and after being invited to some mentoring, he discovers his true calling: helping entrepreneurs to scale their businesses (or at least not get shipwrecked in this quest!)

At the beginning of 2008, along with Laura Constantini, he founded Astella, starting a pioneering cycle in the Brazilian Venture Capital market.

Edson is often recognized as one of the greatest references in Latin America when the subject is Go-to-Market and is passionate about product management. He is the partner behind flagship investments like RD Station and Omie.

Laura studied business at Getulio Vargas University and chose the path of finance that eventually led to her career in equity research at Banco Santander in Brazil and NY and Banco Garantia, primarily in the TMT industry. 

During that time, she met Edson Rigonatti, who was her source of information on technology.

After a complete research cycle with public equities, Laura decided to shift her career to leverage her analytical capability and build the skills driven by a practical approach to deal-making and origination of opportunities. In 2005 moved to Cicerone Capital to work alongside Edson in M&A.

From their successful partnership, Astella was born in 2008.

Since then, Laura became a pioneer among women investing in Venture Capital in Latin America, discovering her true vocation by combining a solid background in finances with a human vision, which seeks to understand the value of diversity and differences of each entrepreneur.

Laura looks for founders with a great vision capable of disrupting or bringing efficiency to an entire value chain. She looks for opportunities to deliver our society and economy new alternatives that generate value and solve our main existential problems, from feeding more people to providing a better quality of life. 

 Currently, she is the board member on investments like Jota, Sled, Cayena, and Croct. 

In 2021 she became a Kauffman Fellow.

Marcelo learned to code at home and opened his first business at 18 years old, a computer school.

The school did not go forward, but the love for technology and education was the spark that created CIATECH, which he founded alongside partner Alex Augusto.

In 21 years, the company became a major software house specializing in CD-ROM projects. Then, it completely pivoted its business model with the growth of the Internet to become the leader of B2B Brazilian Edtech.

In 2010, the then CTO decided to go deeper into the business world and graduated in Finance from Universidade Getulio Vargas, also accumulating the position of CFO.

A portfolio company of Astella's first fund, and with a successful exit to UOL in 2013, Sato stayed at UOL Education during his earn-out period until 2017, focusing on M & A and consolidating the company's operation as a leader in online education in Brazil.

In 2017, he joined Astella as a partner, focusing on origination and governance.

With 25 years of experience in both SMB and high enterprise companies, Marcelo is investing in the next generation of fast-growing and efficient B2B companies. He is the partner on the board of companies such as Bornlogic, BossaBox, and Aprova Digital.

Daniel spent twenty-five years in the communications and marketing industry before joining Astella in 2017.

Always a tech enthusiast, (he participated in the deal of the first banner ad sold in Brazil by UOL back in 1996), and in 2000 became the Head of Content at Zip.Net web portal (sold to Portugal Telecom). Back to the ad industry as an entrepreneur co-founding the agency MPM, which later merged with Loducca and was considered one of the five most creative independent shops globally.

By the time of Loducca's acquisition, he already had over eight years of relationship with Astella, mentoring companies, co-investing, and later as a Limited Partner.

He completely pivoted his career to Venture Capital. 

Since then, he is keen on finding entrepreneurs who are willing to challenge gigantic markets against established players across all economic sectors with a particular interest in consumer, prosumer, the creator economy and B2B business with a product-led growth strategy.

Daniel is the partner behind some of Astella's leading D2C (Direct-To-Consumer) businesses, such as Sallve and Dr. Jones, health-tech Livance, and music-tech Inda.band.

He lives with his family in São Paulo, plays bass guitar and synthesizers, and rides a bicycle whenever he can.