In less than a decade, Alejandro Cremades LL.M. ’09 went from working as an international arbitration lawyer to becoming a financial guru.
In addition to serving as a consultant for those looking to secure capital for new businesses and as an advisor on mergers and acquisitions, Cremades is a two-time best-selling author. His latest book, Selling Your Startup: Crafting the Perfect Exit, Selling Your Business, and Everything Else Entrepreneurs Need to Know, ranked as the number one new release in consolidation and merger publications on Amazon after hitting bookshelves July 27.
The roadmap to Cremades’ success is one that features a nearly 3,600-mile move from Madrid to Manhattan, a career change from lawyering to entrepreneurship, and, most recently, becoming a podcast host.
The Road to Law School
Growing up in the Cremades household often involved discussing cases at dinnertime between Cremades’ father, grandfather, and uncles,who were all lawyers. As a result, he says that pursuing a career in the legal field was a no-brainer. Cremades received his law degree at Universidad San Pablo CEU. He later set his sights on more education and internship experiences in the United States to further his career.
The combination of his family’s legal legacy and his own interest in the United States led Cremades to law school at Fordham, where he enrolled in the LL.M. program in 2008.
After graduating with an LL.M. degree in international business and trade law a year later, Cremades joined King & Spalding as an associate. There, he worked within the business litigation group, mainly involved in high-profile investment arbitration cases in Latin America, including Chevron v. Ecuador, one of the biggest arbitration cases in history with $113 billion at stake.
While working at King & Spalding, one of Cremades’ friends who worked in the hedge fund field asked Cremades to accompany him to a tech meetup.
“I was probably the only person in the audience who was wearing a suit and a tie,” Cremades recalled. “What really got me hooked was the whole concept of innovation, people pitching their ideas, and other people chipping in and brainstorming.”
Making a Career Move
Soon after, Cremades began mingling and networking with other entrepreneurs and founders. “I saw an interesting gap where founders weren’t able to access capital,” he said. “I started thinking about this and I couldn’t sleep at night. I remember developing what would become the entire business model behind my company, RockThePost [eventually rebranded as Onevest].”
Cremades left King & Spalding in 2012 to co-found Onevest, a company connected startups with investors, alongside his now wife Tanya.
“We realized that it was not about the transaction or the financing in place,” Cremades explained. “It was about what happened pre- and post-financing.”
Their startup, which ultimately grew to more than 500,000 founders in 234 countries, was acquired by a California-based media corporation in 2018 through a multimillion-dollar transaction.
That same year, Cremades also launched the DealMakers podcast where he interviews successful entrepreneurs around the world. The podcast is on the brink of hitting two million downloads with an average 10,000 listeners tuning in every episode.
“I started it [the podcast]because I was tired of reading and hearing from media outlets, ‘This company is so successful, that other company is so successful,'” said Cremades, explaining that he wanted to see more “raw” stories instead.
“People were not talking about the incredible sacrifices and the emotional roller coaster it takes to start a company.”
Today, Cremades is the co-founder of Panthera Advisors, a premier investment banking and financial consulting firm specializing in mergers and acquisitions, capital fundraising, company valuations, and strategic planning. Since 2020, the firm has been able to execute various types of transactions from as little as $250,000 to as much as $100 million.
Becoming an Influencer
Cremades’ first book, The Art of Start-up Fundraising, became a reality in 2016 after trying to become more educated about how to secure capital for new businesses and how to build and scale a company.
“I couldn’t find any book that was written by an entrepreneur,” said Cremades, noting that his book provides guidance on how startup funding works.
“All of them were written by investors who didn’t really care much about the founders because they were just investing in them, coming with the background of a Wall Street suit and tie. “That was not the entrepreneurial type of mindset that I was hoping to get for guidance.”
“He became this really successful and impactful entrepreneur who was not only doing entrepreneurship, but testifying about entrepreneurship, writing about entrepreneurship, and really becoming an influencer in the entrepreneurial world,” said Toni Jaeger-Fine, assistant dean of international and non-J.D. programs at Fordham Law.
Advice for Entrepreneurs
On July 29, Cremades held a book launch for Selling Your Startup, sharing his secrets to success with Fordham Law faculty, students, and aspiring entrepreneurs. Unlike other books on the market, Selling Your Startup provides a roadmap to the practical realities of successful company acquisitions. The event was co-hosted by Fordham Law’s office of international and non-J.D. programs and the entrepreneurial law program.
“The media often paints a glamorous picture with the success stories of entrepreneurship, but the reality is that about 80 to 90% of all startups fail,” said Bernice Grant, senior director of the entrepreneurial law program and founding director of the entrepreneurial law clinic at Fordham Law.
“We’re here to talk about startups that managed to beat those odds and succeed, and even to get bought out by an acquirer.”
Cremades wrote Selling Your Startup while his own company was in a growth mode. “We did three acquisitions, buying three other companies to fuel the growth of our business,” Cremades told the audience, “and I couldn’t find anything that had to do with selling your startup.”
Looking back on his career thus far, Cremades said he had no regrets. “If I could go back in time, I would do it all over again,” he confessed to the audience. “You’re bringing all of those lessons from your previous experiences with you. And I think, for me, whether it was my student experience at Fordham or my experience as an attorney at King & Spalding, they provided me with that training to anticipate potential issues down the line.”
Cremades remains grateful to Fordham Law for not only helping him grow as an aspiring lawyer, but for continuing to support him in his entrepreneurial endeavors.
“Fordham placed a bet on me to come when I was just 22 years old, graduating from law school in Spain,” Cremades said. “Fordham helped me realize all my dreams and is always going to be in my heart because, without Fordham, I would not be where I’m at today.”