Jon Azua

An Industrial Engineer, from the University of Anahuac (Mexico) and the University of the Basque Country (E.T.S.I.I.T. – Engineering School of Bilbao), Jon is also qualified in Business Administration with an MBA from the University of Navarre (I.E.S.E. – Institute of Business Studies, Barcelona) and a PhD in Business & Public Administration from the Lasalle University, USA.

With extensive experience in the area of Public Administration and Business, Jon has held important posts in the Basque Country as Regional Minister for the Promotion and Economic Development of Bizkaia, Basque Minister and Vicelehendakari (deputy prime minister), Managing partner of the Practice of Strategy, Business and Government for Spain and managing partner for Government Industries and the Public Sector for EMEIA ( Europe, India and Middle East) BearingPoint. In the private sector, his career encompasses posts in entities such as the Bilbao Stock Exchange( CEO) and the company Bilbao Plaza Financiera , and he has also served on the Board of Directors of a number of organisations such as Petronor, Osakidetza-Basque Health Service, Eusko Trenbideak (Basque public railway company), Consorcio de Transportes de Bizkaia (Bizkaia Transport Consortium), Euskalnet (Telecommunications), SPRI (Organisation for Industrial Reconversion and Promotion), Ente Vasco de Energía (Basque Energy Board), Forjas de México (Forging company), etc. 

He is currently President of Enovatinglab, S.L., a platform for strategy, competitiveness and regional development whilst, in the area of education, he is connected to the prestigious centres of ITESM (México), I.E.S.E. (University of Navarre - Barcelona) and  Deusto University ( Deusto Business School and Orkestra).In addition, he is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation in New York, an Eisenhower Fellow 1998 and a member of the International Advisory Board for the “Cities Project” (an International research program directed at identifying and developing Clusters of Excellence in 20 different cities). A member of the Board of Directors and Board of Advisors of a number of Corporations  as ORACLE ( Iberia),GUASCOR ,IMQ and Bio-Praxis Group. and a regular collaborator in different media and a conference speaker, Jon has published numerous articles and research work, including his latest two books, “Competitive netting for the new economy: Businesses – Governments and Innovative Regions” , and “ Clustering the economy and Glokalization”. He chairs the Advisory Board of the ORKESTRA-Basque Institute for Competitiveness. Co-chair of the Knowledge Generation Committee of the MOC (Microeconomics of Competitiveness) Leadership Team at the ISC at Harvard University.