Javier Santiso Guimaras
Member of the Board of Directors
Member of the Nominations, Compensation and Corporate Governance Commission
Javier Santiso Guimaras is a Member of the Board of Directors and a Member of the Appointments, Remuneration and Corporate Governance Committee.
Javier Santiso is CEO and General Partner of Mundi Ventures, a venture capital fund (500 million) He is an investor in tech unicorns such as Farfetch and Skyscanner in the UK, Auto1 and Wefox in Berlin, Bolttech in Singapore, Betterfly in Miami, Klarna in Stockholm and Shift Technology in Paris. He is on the boards of a range of startups, such as Clarity (New York), Twinco (Rotterdam) and Convelio (Paris).
He is also a member of the board of directors of FNAC Darty in Paris, where he serves on its appointments and remuneration committee. Previously, he was chief economist at Indosuez (Paris) and BBVA (Madrid), heading emerging markets. He served as director of the OECD, the youngest in the entire history of the organization, and as chief economist of the OECD Development Center. He oversaw corporate transformation at the Amerigo venture capital fund, which he founded, at Telefónica. .
He has also served as CEO in Europe of Khazanah, Malaysia's sovereign wealth fund (US$50 billion) and as its global head of technology investments. Khazanah has invested in a dozen unicorns, including Alibaba in China, Palantir in the United States and Farftech in Europe. He was instrumental in the development of its international office and in setting up its headquarters in London. At that time he was also on the board of directors of Axiata Digital, where he had oversight of the investment committee.
Santiso is an avid art collector and is a patron of culture. He is on the International Board of Trustees of the Prado Museum and the Teatro Real; He is also a member of the Board of Trustees of the San Fernando Royal Academy of Arts. He is the founder of the art and poetry publishing house La Cama Sol, and works with artists such as Lita Cabellut, Etel Adnan, Soledad Sevilla, Anselm Kiefer, Jaume Plensa, Miquel Barceló, Rafael Canogar, Juan Uslé, and authors such as Joan Margarit, Pere Gimferrer, Christian Bobin, Tahar Ben Jelloum, Pascal Quignard, some of whom he has translated into Spanish.
He has published a dozen books, including Un sol de pulpa oscura (A sun of dark pulp) (Madrid, Franz Ediciones, 2020) with the Iranian artist Shirin Salehi, the novel Vivir con el corazón (Living with the heart) (Madrid, La Huerta Grande, 2021) about the life of Van Gogh, El sabor a sangre no se me quita de la voz (La Huerta Grande, 2022), about the life of Camarón de la Isla; and El cuento de las risas perdidas (The tale of lost laughter) (La Huerta Grande, 2023).
In 2023, he published his first novel in French with the Gallimard publishing house, under the prestigious NRF “Blanche” imprint: Un pas de deux (Gallimard, 2023), a fictional life of Jo and Edward Hopper. He has a number of upcoming novels, including Outrenoirs, a nod to the painter Pierre Soulages.
Category:
Independent
First and last appointments:
- 22 December 2020
- 29 June 2021
Boards of Directors of other listed companies to which he serves (*):
- Director of Fnac Darty.
(*) Excluding: (i) holding or family-owned companies and (ii) positions in companies that had been already recorded in the previous biographical note.
Boards of Directors of other non- listed companies to which he serves (*):
- Director of Clarity.ai
- Director of Twinco
- Director of Le Monde
- CEO of La Cama Sol
- Director of Arros
(*) Excluding: (i) holding or family-owned companies and (ii) positions in companies that had been already recorded in the previous biographical note.
Other paid activities:
The director does not perform other paid activities different to those above declared.