Antonio Vives

Principal Associate

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Principal Associate, Cumpetere

Consulting Professor, Stanford University 

He is currently a member of the Advirory Panel on Sustainability of CEMEX, a member of the Public Infrastructure Advisory Commission of the State of California, and a member of the Board of Directors of the International Business Leader's Forum, Americas. 

Former Manager of the Sustainable Development Department of the Inter-American Development Bank, IDB.   He was with the IDB in various capacities for 28 years.  Most recently his expertise has been devoted to sustainability, corporate social responsibility, business climate, infrastructure finance, financial market development and micro and SME finance in emerging economies. He led the IDB efforts in Sustainability, producing the IDB's first Sustainability Report and creating the Sustainable Energy and Climate Change Initiative.

He was a member of the Investment Committee of the Pension Fund of the Bank (currently over US$2.5 billion in assets) for 25 years, 15 of which as Vice-Chairman.

Mr. Vives has been a professor at the IESA Graduate School of Management in Venezuela, and at the graduate business schools of Carnegie Mellon, George Washington and Virginia Tech universities in the United States. He is currently Consulting Professor in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department at Stanford University.

He has authored a textbook on corporate financial evaluation and published numerous articles on corporate social responsibility, financial management and private infrastructure. Most recent publications are Private Infrastructure: Ten Commandments for Sustainability; Pension Funds in Infrastructure Project Finance: Regulations and Instrument Design; Private Infrastructure Investment at the Subnational Level: Challenges in Emerging Economies, all published in The Journal of Project Finance, and “Financial Intermediation and Policy Based Lending: Policy Recommendation for Latin America and the Caribbean”. Most recently co-wrote "Financial Structuring of Infrastructure Projects in Public Private Partnerships", published by the IDB, “The Economics and Finance of Water” presented by the World Bank at the Expo2008 in Zaragoza, Spain and “Selecting infrastructure delivery modalities: No time for ideology or semantics” published in the Journal of Construction Engineering and Management.

Has edited the first five volumes of the Proceedings of the Inter-American Conferences on Corporate Social Responsibility and written numerous articles on the topic, the most recent ones being: "¿Es nuestra responsabilidad?" (in Harvard Business Review, America Latina, April 2008) and "Corporate Social Responsibility: The role of law and markets and the case of developing countries" (in the Chicago-Kent Law Review, 2008), “The Role of Multilateral Development Institutions in Fostering Corporate Social Responsibility”, published in Development, "Estrategias de Responsabilidad Social Local en un contexto global: Empresas Multinacionales en América Latina" published in Revista sobre la Responsabilidad Social de la Empresa, 2009,  and “Corporate Social Responsibility in Small and Medium Enterprises in Latin America”, published in the Journal of Corporate Citizenship and a book (in Spanish) with the same title, published by the IDB. He is currently writing a book on Corporate Social Responsibility in Latin America.

He writes a popular blog on CSR in Spanish, Una mirada crítica a la responsabilidad social de la empresa en Iberoamérica.  www.cumpetere.blogspot.com

Was a member of the two international panels on water finance led by Michel Camdessus and Angel Gurria.  Was the co-chair of the Working Group on Renewable Energy of the World Economic Forum.  Has been a lecturer in more than 100 international conferences, on CSR, infrastructure finance, financial markets development, business climate and micro and SME finance.

Mr. Vives, a Spaniard, holds a degree in Chemical Engineering.  Also holds a master's degree in Industrial Administration (MBA), and a Ph.D. in Finance (Corporate Finance and Capital Markets), both from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Alvaro R. Ramirez

Senior Associate

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Former Chief of the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprise Division of the Inter-American Development Bank, IADB. The Division was responsible for coordinating and implementing the Bank’s strategy with regards to micro, small and medium enterprises, in order to promote the conditions necessary for the growth and development of the sector in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). To implement the strategy, the Division provided loans and technical assistance to local institutions, facilitated the sharing of information, experiences and technical know-how, and published research on innovative policies, projects and programs.

He joined the IADB in 1980 to work on the Equity Financing Program for small enterprises and later worked as Operations Coordinator for several countries and as Principal Advisor to the Manager in one of the Regional Operations Departments. His final was the management of the Social Entrepreneurship Program, providing loans and technical assistance to more than 150 innovative projects to support microentrepreneurs and microfinance development in LAC; also provided leadership in the Multilateral Investment Fund’s (MIF) special program for the strengthening of microfinance institutions through downscaling of commercial banks and upgrading non-government organizations

Was the leader of the annual Inter-American Microenterprise Forum -- the foremost regional event to exchange best practices in the field by bringing together the major private and public development agencies and microfinance practitioners.

Mr. Ramirez has published several articles in micro and SME finance and was responsible for the oversight and supervision of a wide range of publications that highlighted innovations, emerging trends and cutting-edge topics in the small and microenterprise sector, providing value-added to the IADB’s programming as well as key insights that helped shape the policies and practices of public and private organizations working to promote the advancement of the small and microenterprise sector. He is a frequent lecturer in international conferences.

From 2000-2007 Mr. Ramirez was he focal point for the IADB in the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP) and the Donors Committee for Enterprise Development, providing new ideas for the development of the sector in the region.

Mr. Ramirez, a national from Nicaragua, holds a degree in Industrial Engineering from Purdue University. He has also pursued graduate studies at the same university and completed courses in Finance at Virginia Tech and American University. Before joining the Bank, he was Director of the Division of Small Enterprises at the Special Fund for Development, in the Central Bank in Nicaragua.