Mercedes Bidart

Mercedes is the co-founder and CEO of Quipu Bank, a platform that enables communities to re-design their economies by changing the way micro-businesses credit assessment is done. She is passionate about the potential of technology to foster civic and economic collaboration in marginalized communities.

 Her passion for building economic justice stems from her experience in her home country, Argentina, where she ran community development projects in informal settlements with the NGO TECHO and worked for CIPPEC’s Cities Program building capacity across local governments in Latin America. She moved to the US in 2017 to pursue a Masters in City Planning at MIT. While at MIT, besides building Quipu, she collaborated with the Community Innovators Lab, U.Lab, MIT CREATE, the SPURS Program, and Presencing Institute’s ‘Societal Transformation Lab’, a global network of teams leading system change initiatives. After MIT, she moved to NYC to advise the Deputy Mayor for Policy Strategy of the City on ‘new economy’ strategies to support minorities and women-owned businesses.

Mercedes’ work was featured in Forbes, Norman Foster Stories, and El Pais; and was awarded by SOCAP, MIT Innovation Initiative, MIT DesignX Accelerator, World Bank Youth Summit, and IDB Lab among others. Quipu was awarded by Fast Company as one of the ten most innovative companies in LATAM in 2022 and by Accion Center of Financial Inclusion as one of the world’s 50 more inclusive fintechs. She holds a master's degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Fulbright Scholar) and a Bachelor's in Political Science from the University of Buenos Aires.