Gustavo Cisneros

Gustavo A. Cisneros Rendiles ( born June 1, 1945 in Caracas ) is a Venezuelan entrepreneur in the media and beverage industry. He is considered the Latin American media mogul. With assets of about 3.4 billion U.S. dollars ( according to Forbes ), he and his family belong to the 150 richest people in the world.

Background and Career

Cisneros is the son of Cuban-born entrepreneur Diego Cisneros. He studied business administration at the private business school Babson College in Wellesley, United States.

Diego Cisneros had operated a trucking company since 1929 in Caracas in 1940 and concessionaire of Pepsi in Venezuela. In 1960 he had received with his group the concession for the private television Venevisión, on the basis of the bankrupt private broadcaster Televisión Independiente, SA has been established.

Entrepreneurial activity

His son, Gustavo took over in 1968, the position of the chairman and CEO of the Cisneros Group of Companies. In Venevisión he built in the 1970s and 1980s from its production activities in the field of TV shows and telenovelas. He also acquired with the corporate group concessions of U.S. firms in the food and entertainment industry, including Burger King, Pizza Hut, Sears Roebuck and Blockbuster video stores.

In 1992, the Cisneros Group, a significant proportion of Univisión, the largest provider of Spanish language television programs in the United States. The internationalization of the Cisneros Group, which participated in the subsequent years of TV channels and pay-TV stations across Latin America, including Chilevisión and Caracol TV in Colombia began. Was launched in 1996 as a sub - group of companies, Cisneros Television Group.

In 2008, in addition to Venevisión include the Cerveceria Regional, Americatel, the elections to Miss Venezuela and the baseball team Leones del Caracas to the group.

Political Attitudes

Cisneros was a supporter of the market- liberal policies, enacted by the two-time President Carlos Andrés Pérez. Following the appointment of Hugo Chavez, he is one of the perfiliertesten opponents of the president, which he feared the nationalization of its Venezuelan TV and radio stations. Chavez, in turn, is Cisneros ' media companies against openly critical, after the transmitter of the Cisneros Group did not report inter alia on the demonstrations for Chávez in the attempted coup against this in 2002. Cisneros has its operations now to 80 per cent abroad, especially in the other countries of Latin America and the United States, laid. The importance of the Cisneros Group in open opposition to Chávez went back with his reign consolidation.