How did technology become a competitive advantage in V1?
Having technology is not the same as building a competitive advantage with it. See how V1 made this transition in practice.
As V1's trajectory shows, transforming technology into a competitive advantage requires much more than adopting the right tools; it demands a culture that puts the customer at the center of every decision and tests before investing.
In this article, you will understand how V1 built a mobility product based on a real business pain point and what this journey teaches us about the strategic role of technology within a company.
What happens when technology and business don't speak the same language?
When technology and business operate on separate planes, the impact goes beyond poorly structured processes; it compromises the customer experience, generates rework, and prevents the company from scaling consistently.
This conflict is more common than it seems, especially in companies that grew with traditional models and need to reinvent themselves without losing what already works.
As highlighted by Raphael Leitão, Head of Technology and Innovation at V1, during the InsightCast episode:
“We don’t walk into a room and start creating things out of thin air. That’s not innovation, that’s invention. We’ve always looked at what our pain points are, what problem we need to solve.”
The challenge, therefore, is not choosing between innovating or maintaining operations, but building a culture that does both at the same time.
How did V1 transform a product limitation into a new service area?
Treating customer feedback as strategic data is what separates companies that merely improve products from those that create new businesses from it.
In version 1, some customers found the app difficult to use, especially older people who valued the service but experienced friction in the ordering process. Instead of simplifying the interface, the company eliminated the app from the equation and brought the service to where the customer already was.
The result was an on-demand driver service operated via WhatsApp, with embedded artificial intelligence that interprets requests by text or voice, recognizes the customer's profile, and delivers the service with the same quality standards as in-person operations.
How can you test quickly without compromising operational stability?
Scaling without a process is one of the most expensive mistakes a company can make. V1 learned this early on and structured a validation approach that protects both the customer experience and the financial health of the business.
In practice, V1 Prime spent two months in pilot operation without charging anything, without an app, with only one person manually processing orders, to validate whether the value proposition was real before any investment in technology.
As Raphael emphasized during the episode:
“Implementing technology where there is no process is scaling chaos. You get seduced by the speed, things start to grow, and you have to redo everything. This will be very expensive and will impact the customer experience at the end.”
This model was the same one used in the launch of the original V1 in 2017 and continues to be the basis for any new product or feature.
What role does data play in this process?
At V1, knowing the customer is not a marketing practice; it's an operational factor that defines everything from the service offered to the type of post-sales approach.
It was the analysis of customer profiles that identified mothers with young children as a specific audience with an objection in the sales process: the lack of a certified car seat. The solution was to purchase the car seats, map which customers had children, and offer the service with this need already met, without the customer having to ask.
As Raphael highlighted in the episode, the risk of going the opposite way is real: accumulating data without a clear objective is to waste time and resources without generating useful information.
Transform technology into a competitive advantage.
Building a competitive advantage with technology isn't a matter of budget or adopting the latest tools. It's a matter of culture, of how the company listens to the customer, validates hypotheses, and makes data-driven decisions before scaling.
An example that illustrates this mentality well comes from Raphael Leitão himself, who closely followed the first rides for individuals in V1. When drivers started going out with umbrellas in the rain to pick up passengers, nobody had asked for that; it was the service standard that the team had built.
This reinforces the idea that consistent innovation requires integration between technology, operations, and leadership committed to customer outcomes, not just technical delivery.
