Adelson Sousa and his passion for the south of Bahia helped build what Nampur is today

At 53 years of age, the businessman is the father of Victor Meireles, co-founder of the real estate development company. His passion for building houses in the region has passed down to the next generation of the family.

Businessman Adelson Sousa is one of the main people responsible for the construction of Nampur, the real estate development company dedicated to high-end houses in the south of Bahia. His passion has been passed down to his son Victor, who would become co-founder of the company focused on high-end houses in that region. "He grew up watching us build our houses. We had a plot of land, then we bought the one next to it. So, that land grew... These boys grew up watching the house grow with them," he reflects.

Him and his wife, the decorator Cássia Meireles, started to frequent the south of Bahia in 1989, after their wedding. The visits intensified after their sons Gabriel and Victor were born. For him, Bahia is a happy and welcoming state, with an energy you can feel in the air. "On the ferry crossing over to Arraial d'Ajuda, you already switch off and disconnect. You arrive really quickly and it's a radical transformation of nature. An indescribable beauty, of this junction between a unique, marvelous sea, beautiful warm waters and flowing rivers, and the Atlantic Forest and the cliffs." 

FAMILY

Adelson says that Victor is the one responsible for the family passion turning into a business. It was his visionary eye and enthusiasm to be an entrepreneur and evolve that convinced him to make this passion become a business when he sold the first two houses to friends and invested in the real estate development company. "It's not easy for a second generation to get this enthusiasm, do it and do it better," he explains. "I speak with confidence: I'm an excellent entrepreneur, but Victor will be much better than me and he’s already proving it," he says, explaining that he trusts his son’s capacity to produce and deliver well-made things.

FRIENDS

Despite the communication gap between photographer Dean Freeman from London and Adelson, who doesn't speak English, they formed a friendship through empathy. In an age without Google Translator, they communicated through gestures and with the help of a dictionary. "He's this typical quiet gringo and we had all this energy, which he found contagious," he remembers.  They ended up becoming friends almost two decades ago and they share their passion for the paradisiacal destination whenever they can. (READ DEAN FREEMAN'S PROFILE) 

HOBBY

Adelson laughs when he says his hobby is being an entrepreneur. He doesn't even play golf anymore... He has invested his time in two things that he loves: the environment and agribusiness. "Focused on a really innovative project producing grain in a region of the Amazon called Lavrado, in the state of Roraima. It’s a huge, 3-million-hectare desert-like biome. It's possible to produce in Amazonas without cutting down a single tree," he says. Another project that is on the table is the preservation of forests, also in the Amazon region, with the aim of producing in degraded areas. In São Paulo, another project dedicated to the real estate sector with an environmental focus is in the environmental licensing phase: an ecosystem of innovation and technology to preserve more than 1 million square meters of Atlantic Forest. 

TRAJECTORY

Born in the interior of the state of São Paulo, in Álvares Machado (a town in the west of the state, close to Presidente Prudente), Adelson has always been involved with innovation and technology. From humble origins, he began his trajectory as a scrap metal collector, went through different jobs until he went to work for the National Credit Bank (BCN), towards the end of his adolescence. When he was unable to juggle athletics and work, he took a risk and became a creative entrepreneur. He was a salesman, then lived off prospecting on the Madeira River (in the Amazon basin), in the 1980s he owned a garlic distributor and began to build computers in an independent and self-taught manner. 

With this expertise, he brought Byte magazine, the information technology bible at the time, to Brazil. He sold the title in 1997 to the publisher Globo, and in the same year founded IT Mídia—one of the main B2B communication groups in the country's Technology sector. With over 20 years’ experience, and numerous proprietary events, Adelson is taking his forums to Trancoso. "Last year and this one, they were held on-line. As of next year, we will go back to doing them face-to-face," he stresses.