Can you earn money from the work of others while still serving everyone?
Well of course. I have been lucky enough to work side by side with the founders of family businesses and I have verified that most of them want to go beyond mere economic performance to leave the next generation a better company that serves the whole of society.
And have you done it yourself?
And I was lucky enough to suffer a bankruptcy as a child...
In Spain, not everyone would say that it is lucky.
I was born in Barcelona, in Guinardó, and the family was four people in a 60 square meter flat. I never had great luxuries, but I was lucky that my father, who was a humble businessman, went bankrupt when I was 12 years old.
I still don't see luck in an embargo...
I remember that people showed up at the house to plunder it because they had repossessed it. And this caused me some intellectual restlessness...
Rage against the system?
I only checked what it costs to progress when the system is not prepared for certain circumstances regardless of your talent. Perhaps that is why my first obsession was to achieve financial independence for my family. And thanks to her I set up my first company at the age of 17.
What was your business model?
First I will tell you that I am proud to have studied professional training, FP, in Image and Sound. With that knowledge I set up a production company with a partner.
And it worked?
The situation was in our favour: we were in the 80s and the boom in audiovisual communication began while new private televisions began to be broadcast. I soon went from being behind the cameras to being in front.
It was the great era of TV, but it's over.
I took advantage of it and continued my studies while working. That's how I realized that the business world attracted me a lot. Above all, technology. And with other partners I set up another pioneering company in artificial intelligence, which was then called machine learning.
It worked?
So much so that in 2011 we sold it to Deloitte, because it already needed to grow and have partners. It was my first serious and powerful business venture. I was progressing, but I wanted to do something for others. So I got interested in philanthropy.
Because?
Because I felt the ability and, at the same time, the need to help and it gave me satisfaction to give in exchange for nothing. While I continued working as an entrepreneur, I dedicated part of my time and resources to helping others. Thus, in 2000, I discovered philanthrocapitalism with Limited at the hands of Cameron.
The British Prime Minister?
He designed an organization that injected 100 million pounds of British lotteries into companies that, in addition to being productive, generated social and environmental impact.
Was it replicable in Spain?
So much so that we also did it here with Limited until I went to Indra...
Huge technology company.
The first employer of engineers in Spain, where I was the commercial and marketing director of 52,000 employees, which I tried to align with our objective of serving sustainability and social impact.
As?
I wanted to turn them into business activists who, in addition to looking for economic performance, achieved a positive social and environmental impact at the same level as the economic one.
It worked?
So much so that I decided to set up a small boutique impact company that helps large businessmen and managers to redirect their companies with double accounting: they measure economic performance on the one hand, and social and environmental impact on the other.
Isn't it all greenwashing, the mere facelift of companies?
This occurs in companies tied to obtaining short-term economic returns; but it is also true that the EU is legislating so that they comply with the social and environmental agenda, even if they do not believe it.
How does a businessman differ from a mere speculator with the surplus value of others?
The entrepreneur, in addition to providing a product or service to achieve benefits to maintain the company and its employees, generates well-being for the entire society, starting with the community where it is. An entrepreneur also works for the following generations; the speculator only for himself and at the expense of others and the environment.
Is Spain a country of activists who want to be subsidized?
Spain is a country of entrepreneurs and the company is the great engine of social progress when it is capable of transcending the mere search for short-term profit.
