Mara Pereira — Co-Founder

I quit a six-figure job at Microsoft to build my own thing. In 4 years I turned my data & AI skills into: → $450K+ in revenue as a solopreneur → Consulting projects up to $45K → Three online courses, $200K+ in sales, 750+ students → All while traveling the world But I didn't start there. My first project took 2 months. I worked 10+ days for free because I had no scope control. I invoiced at the end and hoped the customer would pay me. My last project took 2 weeks. I charged $45,000. Same skills. Different system. After all this I can tell you... Your technical skills are not the bottleneck. Nobody taught you how to package them, price them, sell them, or deliver them without the project spiraling. That's what I teach now. I created the Data & AI Monetization Accelerator. A 12-week program where I hand over my entire business playbook. This is for two types of people: 1) You're employed, making good money, but you see the ceiling. You want to build something on the side that could eventually give you real freedom. 2) You're freelancing at $3K-$5K/project, charging by the hour, doing custom work. You want to package your services, charge more, and stop trading all your time for money. What's inside: → Personal brand & LinkedIn strategy → Offer creation & packaging → Sales (without being salesy) → Pricing systems with actual calculators → Delivery with scope control & legal templates → Scaling into digital products & recurring revenue 90+ lessons. 36 workbooks. 12 AI prompts. Legal templates, DM scripts, pricing calculators. Plus the full system I used on real $45K projects. Featured in Business Insider, Tech Times, Benzinga. Speaker at SQLBits, Big DataLDN, DataMinds. 2024 Data & AI Leader of the Year nominee. Want to learn how I did it? DM me "accelerator" or check the link below.

Stackforce AI infers this person is a SaaS entrepreneur specializing in data and AI monetization.

Location: Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Experience: 5 yrs 3 mos

Skills

Business Development
Entrepreneurship

Career Highlights

Generated $450K+ in revenue as a solopreneur
Created three online courses with $200K+ in sales
Nominated for Data & AI Leader of the Year

Work Experience

Mara Pereira Digital

Founder (9 mos)

YouTube

Wannabe YouTube Star (3 yrs 7 mos)

Data Pears

Power BI Report Design Girl (Solo Adventure) (3 yrs 10 mos)

Microsoft

Power BI Report Design Girl (1 yr 5 mos)

Education

Master of Science - MSc at Universidade de Coimbra

Post Graduation at Porto Business School

Mechanical Engineering at Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina

Business Intelligence and Logistics at Eindhoven University of Technology

Mara Pereira

Co-Founder

Dubai, United Arab Emirates5 yrs 3 mos experience

Most Likely To SwitchHighly Stable

Key Highlights

Generated $450K+ in revenue as a solopreneur
Created three online courses with $200K+ in sales
Nominated for Data & AI Leader of the Year

Stackforce AI infers this person is a SaaS entrepreneur specializing in data and AI monetization.

Contact

Skills

Core Skills

Business DevelopmentEntrepreneurship

Other Skills

Personal BrandingLinkedIn StrategyOffer CreationSalesPricing SystemsDelivery SystemsPower BIConsultingContent CreationE-LearningContent StrategyDigital MarketingDigital StrategyBusiness Strategy

About

Experience

Mara pereira digital

Founder

Jun 2025 – Present · 9 mos · Dubai, United Arab Emirates · Remote

Most freelancers build businesses that depend on them.
I build businesses that don’t.
I help tech professionals and freelancers package what they know into scalable systems: products, offers, and frameworks that grow without burning them out.
My specialty started with Power BI, where I built front-end systems that made teams 10x faster and reports look like they had a design team behind them.
Now, I teach others to apply the same logic to their own skills, turning what they do into something repeatable, sellable, and scalable.
What I help people build:
→ Offers that sell without begging for projects.
→ Systems that deliver consistent, high-quality results.
→ Digital products that earn while you sleep.
→ Confidence that you can actually step back without it all falling apart.
For who:
→ Freelancers tired of trading time for money.
→ Tech pros who want to turn their skill into a business.
→ Teams ready to grow through systems, not chaos.
Proof it works:
Ex-Microsoft Cloud Solutions Architect.
Built Power BI design systems used by Fortune 500 companies (AstraZeneca, Barclays, BP, Costa Coffee).
Scaled my own online business to multiple six figures with courses, assets, and systems. Not endless sales calls.
This is not:
→ A “make money fast” promise.
→ A theory course you never finish.
This is:
→ A way to turn your expertise into something that scales, step by step.
→ The system I used to go from solo freelancer to a business that runs on autopilot.
If you’re ready to stop building a job and start building a business, that’s where I come in.

Business DevelopmentEntrepreneurship

Youtube

Wannabe YouTube Star

Aug 2022 – Present · 3 yrs 7 mos · Remote

Built a YouTube channel to 29k subscribers. Here is the channel, if you're curious and want to see what I looked like before COVID:
https://www.youtube.com/@datapears

Data pears

Power BI Report Design Girl (Solo Adventure)

Feb 2022 – Dec 2025 · 3 yrs 10 mos · Remote

What started as a desperate attempt to get a raise at Microsoft turned into a $300k+ business.
(Yes, I lost a few thousands in Microsoft stock options to do this. No, I don't want to talk about it.)
The Accidental Entrepreneur Journey:
> Started a Power BI blog while at Microsoft to look impressive during performance reviews
> Began posting tutorials on LinkedIn. People went absolutely feral for pretty reports
> Got bombarded with "your content is amazing, can you help me for free?" messages. Said yes way too many times because I was young and stupid
> Finally grew a brain cell and started charging money.
> Quit Microsoft to pursue this full-time because apparently I enjoy financial anxiety.
The Business Evolution.... Started as a one-woman consulting show:
> First tried hourly billing (rookie mistake)
> Built a system, packaged my expertise, ended up charging $45k for 10 days of work
> Still remember those first thousands hitting my account - better than any Microsoft bonus
> Realized I didn't want my income capped by hours in a day, so created online courses
The Receipts:
In less than 3 years, this little blog turned into:
$200k+ consulting revenue
$100k+ from courses and digital products
35k LinkedIn followers
28k YouTube subscribers
6.5k newsletter subscribers who actually read my emails
Won an award, nominated for Data & AI Leader of the Year
Featured in Business Insider, Tech Times, Benzinga, IBT (mom finally stopped asking when I'm getting a "real job")
Built this entire thing solo with zero business experience from a beach in Thailand because why not. Life was good. Then I got bored. Classic me.

Business DevelopmentEntrepreneurship

Microsoft

Power BI Report Design Girl

Dec 2020 – May 2022 · 1 yr 5 mos · United Kingdom

Hired as the rare unicorn who could both understand Power BI's technical depths AND make reports so pretty they'd make C-Level execs weep tears of joy. Apparently, this combination is rarer than finding someone who actually reads terms and conditions.
What I actually did:
> Made Power BI reports so visually stunning that customers at BP, AstraZeneca, GSK, and other Fortune 500s would literally ask "wait, this is Power BI?". Yes, Karen from procurement, it is.
> Became the company's secret weapon - whenever someone needed to impress a customer with "what Power BI could REALLY do," my phone rang (more like Teams, but who likes Teams...)
> Gave just a few talks at casual little gatherings like SQLBits and Big Data London (you know, only the biggest data conferences in the UK). Topic? Making data beautiful enough that people actually want to look at it.
Why I left:
Had the absolutely rational thought: "If these massive companies are paying Microsoft big money just to make their reports pretty, why not cut out the middle man?"
So I did what any sane person would do - left one of the world's biggest tech companies to start my own (Data Pears), became a digital nomad and started working from a beach in Thailand.
Haven't made millions yet, but there's still time. Plus, my tan is spectacular now.
P.S. Not listing my previous roles because apparently only the big names matter, and my inability to stay anywhere longer than 2 years would require too much explaining. Microsoft is all you need to know.