Josep Creixell´s Biography

Josep Creixell was born in 1949 and is the CEO and founder of Tradebe. Josep holds an Economy degree and a Law degree from Barcelona University and an MBA from Columbia Business School.

Josep worked in McKinsey (Paris) and in Banco Industrial del Mediterraneo (Barcelona) before starting his entrepreneurial venture: Tradebe. Since 1978, Tradebe has been providing environmental services with specialized expertise in the management, treatment and recycling of waste, with particular emphasis on adding value for our customers.

Tradebe is now one of the leading companies in hazardous waste management in Spain, USA and UK. Its international presence is growing with subsidiaries in France, Turkey and Thailand.  Thanks to Tradebe´s continuing investment in new technologies and by making appropriate acquisitions, tied to improvements at our production facilities, its sales have grown from 37 million Euros in 1999 to 200 million Euros in 2009.  Tradebe employs more than 1100 people worldwide. In 2008, Tradebe managed more than 2 million Tonnes of waste, with 60% of this waste being recycled.

Interview with Didac Lee Diario Negocio www.diarionegocio.es

Didac Lee’s Biography

Dídac Lee is the CEO of Inspirit , a international group made up by the following companies: Inspirit Labs (business incubator), Spamina (email security), Conzentra (internet services) and Intercomgi Argentina (development center). Inspirit employs more than 240 people in Gerona, Barcelona, Madrid , Buenos Aires and the Silicon Valley. He is a usual speaker at Barcelona and Gerona Universities and collaborates with the economic section of El Periodico newspaper.

Awards

2008, “Empordà Award 2008″ Alt Empordà District Council
2008, “International Young Entrepreneur Award” granted by CEAJE
2007, “Gironí de l’Any ” award
2007, “Best ITC Company of the Year”, awarded by the Unió Empresarial del Penedès
2007, “Ferrer Salat Entrepreneur of the Future Award ” by Fomento del Trabajo.
2007, “Best Overseas Entrepreneur Award” by the Taiwanese government.
2007, “Young Entrepreneur Award”, awarded by the International Chamber Youth of Catalonia
2006, “Best Entrepreneur of the Year. Awarded by AIJEC
2005, “Technology Entrepreneur” by the University of Cambridge

José López was born in Madrid in 1967. In 1992 obtained his degree as Telecommunications Engineer from the Madrid Universidad Politécnica. After obtaining a scholarship from the Pedro Barrié de la Maza Foundation, he completed his studies in 1994 with a Masters in Electrical Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania).

He started working in 1994 at Bell Laboratories (Allentown, Pennsylvania), from where he moved to Lucent Technologies in Tres Cantos, Madrid. After four years in the Technology and Product Departments, he was hired in 1998 by Sema Group España, where he created an Intelligent Network and GSM Departament. In 2000 he joined, as Technical Director, Inspira a small technological company in Madrid that he had founded in 1995 with Ignacio Luque and other colleagues from university, devoted to electronics and to photovoltaic solar energy.

In 2001 José López founded, together with his brother Guillermo, Netspira Networks, a spin-off of Inspira to explote a product created by both of them. It was an intelligent router for IP data in mobile wireless networks. With the investment of the private equity fund Bullnet Capital, Netspira grew fast and achieved big clients in Europe, America and Asia, and in 2005 a href=”http://www.netspira.com/”>was acquired by Ericsson. It can be said that Netspira Networks is one of the few successful examples in Spain of the start-up “classic” model of Silicon Valley.

From 2005 to 2007 José López manages Netspira within Ericsson I+D, where Netspira’s product undergoes an important growth. After a sabatical year, from the beginning of 2009 he is commencing a new business adventure, www.bequant.com, again with his brother Guillermo and again in the data networks area.

The Forum took place on 16 April 2009, at the restaurant “La Provenza”. Brothers Igor and Osvald Martret spoke about their entrepreneurial experience and the obstacles that entrepreneurs face currently in the Spanish society with a group of ex – scholars of the Rafael del Pino, “La Caixa“, Fulbright, March, CajaMadrid, Ramón Areces and Barrie de la Maza foundations, as well as with ex- post graduate alumni from MIT, Stanford, University of Chicago, London Business School, Wharton, and Columbia.

DESCRIPTION AND HISTORY OF DRIVANIA

The origins of Drivania International Chauffeur Services go back to 2001, when the Martret Brothers spot an opportunity in the business travel segment, as a result of their professional experience in the transport and tourism sector and of their interest in developing a project of their own with an international scope.

The first two years took place in the storage-room of a friend’s office in Olesa de Montserrat (Barcelona). In January 2003, Drivania International Chauffeur Services moved its corporate domicile to Sant Cugat del Vallés where a stage of growth and consolidation commenced.

All services are processed in a single operations centre with client attention in Spanish, English, French, Italian, Portuguese, German, Dutch, RUssian, Arab and Hebrew. The result of all that is a transportation services network with worldwide coverage and a 24 hour service, which coordinates more than 2,000 chauffeurs in 450 cities, from a single global operations centre located in Sant Cugat del Vallès (Barcelona).

Awarded Best Business Initiative of Year 2004, named one of the Best 100 Spanish Companies of Year 2005, Best PYME 2007 Prize by the employers’ association Pimec, and Recognition to the Business Progress Cecot 2008, Drivania International exemplifies a new batch of transnational companies which are born with a global spirit.

With a clear business strategy driven towards expansion, the company already has two branches in Madrid and Paris. Last 2007, Drivania had a turnover of 3,25 million Euros.

The lunch took place on 28 October, at the presidential dining-hall of the Fundación Rafael del Pino. Cerdán talked about his entrepreneurial experience and about the obstacles currently  faced by entrepreneurs in the Spanish society with a group of  group of ex – scholars of the Rafael del Pino, “la Caixa“, Fulbright, March, Caja Madrid, Ramón Areces and Barriè de la Maza foundations, as well as with post-graduate ex-alumni of MIT, Stanford University, London Business School, Wharton, Columbia and University of Chicago.

JOSÉ CERDÁN’S CV

José Cerdán was born in Zaragoza in 1966 where he studied at the Maristas and Luis Buñuel schools. His professional carreer started with the creation of a sports sponsorship company and of a textile business. Later on, he joined a multinational company dedicated to the sale of computers as Marketing director, where he became aware of the possibilities of the Spanish computer market.
In 1990, he founded, together with José Manuel Manotas and Santiago Mas, the company Ei System, where he stayed until 1998. This company was the first of the four companies comprising the Estratos Group: Estratos Import, Ipermática, Estratos Informática and Flag Internacional Corp, all of them devoted to the commercialization of computer components imported from the United States for the assembly of computers as well as to the sale of already assembled computers under the trademark Ei System.

In 1999 he sold the company to the Dixon Group, today in Spain the chain PC City and a month later he decides to found the first IP Voice company in Europe Peoplecall which is still today operating and with more than one million clients, being pioneer in this technology.
In 2005 he founded an airline operating flights to Africa with 757 planes named  Bravo Airlines; he is also shareholder of a helicopter company named Intercopters, and of an Adverstising and Air Works named Álamo Aviación.
Jose Cerdán, is fan of aviation and he has been a plane and helicopter pilot for more than ten years. He is also fond of sports such as ski, wakeboarding, jet-ski,.etc and all other extreme sports.
He is speaker in numerous forums, such as the political forum Faes, as well as in several universities such us IESE, IE, and also in business forums.

The lunch took place on 10 November, at the presidential dining-hall of the Fundación Rafael del Pino . Juan Fco. Jimeno shared his opinion about the effects of the economic crisis on the Spanish economy with a group of ex – scholars of the  Rafael del Pino, “la Caixa“, Fulbright, March, Caja Madrid, Ramón Areces and Barriè de la Maza foundations, as well as with post-graduate ex-alumni of MIT, Stanford University, London Business School, Wharton, Columbia and University of Chicago.

JUAN FCO. JIMENO’s CV

Work
• Banco de España, Head of Research Division,

Academic Degrees
• Ph. D. in Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1990.
• Licenciado en Ciencias Económicas, Universidad de Alcalá, 1984.

Professional Posts
• Head of the Research Division, Bank of Spain (October 2004-date)
• Professor of Economics, Department of Fundamentals of Economics and Economic History,
Universidad de Alcalá (July 1993-September 2004).
• Senior Researcher, Foundation of Studies of Applied Economics, Madrid (January 1992-
September 2004).
• Assistant Professor, Department of Fundamentals of Economics and Economic History,
Universidad de Alcalá, (from October 1991 to July 1993).
• Lecturer in Economics, London School of Economics, (from October 1990 to September 1991).

The lunch took place on April 8th, in the presidential dining room at the Fundación Rafel del Pino. Mr. Carlos Jiménez shared his vital and entrepreneurial experience with a group of scholars of the Foundations Rafel del Pino, La Caixa, Fulbright, March, Caja Madrid, Ramón Areces, and Barriè de la Maza. Also a group of MIT, Stanford University, LBS, Wharton, Columbia, and University of Chicago alumni were present.

CARLOS JIMÉNEZ PROFILE
Carlos Jiménez, 41, is the only School of Telecommunication Engineering graduate who simultaneously carried five majors during his university studies. He was the creator of the first computer antivirus in 1989.

In 1989 he founded Anyware Seguridad Informática S.A., the first Spanish R+D+i computer security company. Its subsidiary in California (Anyware Software Corporation) manufactured the second antivirus solution most downloaded from the Internet between 1995 and 1998. In 1998 he sold Anyware to McAfee (an American multinational corporation) for 11 million euros, which he used to finance his second project: Secuware.

In 1998 he was approached by the CNI (the Spanish Military Intelligence Service) regarding the need to protect Government computers, particularly those at the Ministries of Defence and the Interior. From Secuware, Jiménez created Crypt2000, the encryption product that is currently used by the Tax Authorities and various Ministries to protect the information stored in their computers, as well as by many of the foremost Spanish companies both in the public and private sectors: Telefónica, Iberdrola, the Spanish Mint, the Bank of Spain, etc.

A regular collaborator with the media, Jiménez has appeared on numerous occasions on news programmes (TVE, A3TV, Tele5, Canal +, TM) and in the printed press (El País, El Mundo, ABC) to comment on computer security incidents. He has taught classes at various universities in Spain (UPM, UPV, Autónoma de Madrid…) and abroad (Paris, Milan, UCLA and Berkeley in the US). He is a weekly participant in Radio Intereconomía’s programme entitled “Internet Professionals”.

He acts as Vice-President of the “Club de Amigos de la Sociedad de la Información” (Friends of the Information Society) presided by Crisanto Plaza, where he shares his vision with the Chairmen and CEO’s of the leading companies in the country.

Member of the Committee of Experts at the Ministry of Science and Technology, he participated in drawing up the 2004-2007 R+D+i Plan regarding “Strategic action for security and trust in the national electronics, computer and Information society plans”.

He participated as a guest consultant in the NATO conference on Terrorism held by the Directors General of Armament and Weapons. His contributions have also encompassed participation in projects such as decoding the Human Genome, the generation of random numbers by software and digital content management, amongst others.

Carlos Jiménez is a blend of entrepreneur and communicator, although he prefers to define himself simply as a technician who is easy to understand. He is considered an authority on computer, PC and network security, and one of the top ten experts worldwide in computer virus and cyber-terrorism.

The lunch took place March 13th in the presidential dining room at the Fundación Rafael del Pino. Mr. Hernández shared his directive and entrepreneurial experience with a group of scholars of the Fundación and a group of Stanford University, LBS, MIT, Harvard University, and University of Chicago alumni.

Juan Verde obtained a Master in Public Administration at the Kennedy School of Government in Harvard University, Bachelor’s degrees in Political Sciences and International Affairs at Boston University, where he graduated cum laude, and he has post-graduate courses at Georgetown University and Tufts University.

Currently, he is the President of Public Administration Strategy Solution (PASS), which provides strategic consulting for business and high-level managers of public administrations.

The lunch took place February 6th, one day after “Super Tuesday”, in the presidential dining room at the Fundación Rafael del Pino. Juan Verde shared his experiences  with a group of Alumni of the Fundación, and also with alumni groups of Stanford University, London Business School, MIT, Harvard University, and University of Chicago.

Juan Carlos Ureta is an Economist and Lawyer by the Universidad de Deusto, Attorney, Stock Broker, Notary, and member / ex-member of the boards at Indra, ING, Lucent Technologies and the Governing Body of the Madrid Stock Exchange.  He is author of several specialized publications in legal and financial fields. He writes weekly in his blog about investments analysis.

The lunch took place December 12th in the presidential dining room at the Fundación Rafael del Pino. Juan Carlos Ureta shared his entrepreneurial experiences with a group of the Foundation Scholars and alumni from LBS, MIT, Harvard University, Columbia University, Stanford University and the University of Chicago.