Alfred Cardenas
Alfred Cardenas
Early Life
Early Childhood
Alfred Cardenas was born in Guiguinto, Bulacan, Philippines. His father, Alberto Bautista Cardenas, is an Automobile salesperson. His mother, Ma. Anita Borromeo Cardenas, is a Hotel Manager. He has one sibling, Albert Angelo Cardenas who is also an entrepreneur.
Before Cardenas went to high school, his whole family moved to the province of Rizal, Philippines. This is where he spent most of his teenage life. During his high school days, Cardenas was involved in different sports. He represented his school in Soccer, Boxing, and Taekwondo during official competitions. During this period, Cardenas developed an intense passion for sports.[6]
College
He developed his passion for technology and Entrepreneurship during his college days at STI College where he took Bachelor of Science in Information technology. He started his first tech Startup company, a Software development firm, while still in college in 2009.
During his college days, Cardenas was inspired by Steve Jobs because of his remarkable success at Apple Inc and Bill Gates for his success in building Microsoft after watching the film Pirates of Silicon Valley in his computer class at STI College.
Career
Early Career
In order to pay for his college tuition, Alfred Cardenas worked at Jollibee Foods Corporation as a service crew for the Fast food restaurant giant. He was a part of Jollibee's SEEDS scholarship program.
He then worked in the Business process outsourcing industry for more than five years at TeleTech. During his time in the BPO industry, Cardenas started his businesses on the side.
He launched different businesses in the Sports equipment, food & beverage, and Perfume sectors before becoming a licensed Financial adviser in the Philippines.
Jungle
In December 2018, Cardenas received a harassing call from a gadget lending company in the middle of a Christmas Day celebration with his family. It was a terrible experience that led him to develop the Jungle idea—a consumer-centric Fintech startup company providing alternative loans for big-ticket purchases in the Philippines.
He left his career as a financial adviser to focus on Jungle full-time.
In order to raise capital, Cardenas joined different pitching competitions in 2019 and eventually represented both Jungle and the Philippines in Techsauce Global Pitching Championships in Bangkok, Thailand and in "Get in the Ring" in Berlin, Germany.
In 2019, Cardenas got accepted into the third cohort of a startup generator program in Singapore called Antler.
He is the only Filipino founder in the cohort.
After three months in the program, Cardenas met the former global CEO of DHL Express, Roger Crook, and two other Singapore-based investors who invested US$125,000.00 for Jungle's Pre-Seed round.
In June 2020, Cardenas left his post as the company's CEO.
The Financial Today
The Financial Today is a direct-to-consumer business news subscription service that provides in-depth news, reports, and analysis that covers business, financial markets, economy, technology, and other topics for the young business and investing communities in Asia-Pacific.
Cardenas launched The Financial Today as a passion project in May 2020.
After four months, the publication had over 22,000 registered users on its news platform and its digital magazine issues were downloaded over 20,000 times in its first two weeks of publication.
The Financial Today drives impressive traffic to its news portal with 14 daily pageviews, 72 minutes daily time on site, and a 19% bounce rate as of October 22, 2020.
Currently, Cardenas serves as the publication's Chief Executive Officer.
The Financial Today (TFT Media Ventures, Inc.) was incorporated in Delaware, United States with headquarters in New York City, New York, United States.
Personal Life
Marriage
Cardenas met his wife, Elaine Victoria Rivera, in 2011 while both were working in TeleTech as call center agents. They got married in March 2016.