About

Hey, I’m Fernando. I like to live life as an experiment.

At seventeen I started an automotive detailing business in Tracy, California. I grew it to 500+ clients over two and a half years and sold the catalog in January 2025. I tried a marketing agency next. It failed. Cold calling is hard.

Then I spent three months building an investment thesis on how Coinbase would push 100 million users onto its new blockchain. I pushed my chips in, watched $50K become $500K, and lost all of it over the next eight months. I turned 20 owing $50K. I took the last of my money backpacking through Asia, came home, and flipped sectional couches to start paying it back.

I was selected as 1 of 12 for the inaugural Poseidon Fellows cohort, which pulled me into startups and venture capital. I am building a private venture summit in San Diego.

I’m drawn to problems of the physical world: climate, hardware, the unglamorous corners of engineering. Something built well stays with people. It is why I write, why I make short films, why I create. I want people to feel something personal and be moved by it.

Currently

  • Founding a Venture Summit in San Diego
  • Studying mechanical engineering & reading philosophy @ UCSD

Writing

Notes

A collection of notes and reflections I keep returning to. Topics include beauty, feeling, engineering, business, and the people who shaped my views.

Read the full piece →

Projects

Venture Summit

Founders and investors in one room in San Diego.

03Coming soon

Go and see.

Places I’ve been and films I created. Highlights from my backpacking trip through Asia.

Tracy · HomeYosemite, two degrees eastSan Diego · nowJapanTokyo · Osaka · Kyoto · Narita · 2025Bangkok2025BaliSingaporeMexico City2024
2025

Japan

0:28
2025

Yosemite

0:26
“To regret one's own experiences is to arrest one's own development.”
Oscar Wilde
“In a world obsessed with more, being grateful is the rarest luxury.”

Reading

Currently

The Brothers Karamazov — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The shelf

  • What I Wish I Knew When I Was 20Tina Seelig
  • Memories, Dreams, ReflectionsCarl Jung
  • Man's Search for MeaningViktor Frankl