Gonzalo Martín-Villa will voluntarily join the Telefónica Group in the coming days. The 53-year-old manager, today alongside Javier de Paz in the new Telefónica Infra, announced his decision to leave the company, thus ending his career in the multinational after more than two decades of professional activity.
Martín-Villa’s departure, which occurred in a context of adjustment and reorganization of work under the presidency of Marc Murtra, was not unexpected. Although, a few months ago, I was appointed general manager of the Infrastructure, Real Estate and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) sector, the director had made it known at the top that his intention was to “change scenery” and seek new horizons in the business sector, as soon as possible. The economist Yes The confidential You confirmed this log.
In this last stage, Martín-Villa played a fundamental role as strategic support in the executive landing of Javier de Paz. The arrival of De Paz to the operational structure — which corresponds to the executive presidency of Movistar+ — required a profile with a deep understanding of figures and the internal functioning of the group.
Although he accepted this temporary right to stabilize the transition, Martín-Villa ultimately negotiated his voluntary resignation with the new responsible operators. His march marks the end of an era for one of the men who were part of José María Álvarez-Pallete’s trusted core.
Martín-Villa’s reduction took place as part of a possible restructuring of Telefónica Infra, six years after its creation in 2019, as part of a new strategy focused on growth and consolidation in key European markets. The Telefónica Infrastructure unit will no longer be part of the core business, as it has been since its creation in 2019, and its assets are expected to be distributed among its subsidiaries.
The march of one of Telefónica’s digital leaders took place after the dismissal of Laura Abasolo from her position as financial director. Abasolo, also from Álvarez-Pallete’s former team, will leave the group on December 31. His role was shared between Juan Azcue, as director of finance and corporate development, and Ernesto Gardelliano, as director of strategy and control.
Founder of Wayra
If anything defines the Martín-Villa trayectoria of Telefónica, it is undoubtedly the creation of Wayra. 15 years ago, the executive drove this vehicle business enterprise cahospital and accelerator startupsdesigned to connect entrepreneurial talent across a multinational.
Thanks to his leadership, Wayra has become a global leader, with significant investment in 180 startups with high technological projection. It consolidated a model in which Telefónica maintained more than 50% of the capital in its subsidiaries, ensuring a strategic symbiosis between external innovation and the needs of the group.
A law graduate from the Complutense University of Madrid, with an LLM from Georgetown University and an MBA from IESE, he joined the company in 2002 in the legal area of Telefónica Internacional. His experience abroad was decisive: he worked for three years in Mexico before returning to Spain in 2005.
He then joined the General Secretariat of Telefónica Latinoamérica, where he reported directly to Álvarez-Pallete, who then directed affairs in the region. Since then, his rise has been meteoric, moving from managing mobile phone operations to becoming Chief Innovation Officer (CIO) globally until 2019.
In addition to his role as UPS, Martín-Villa has been the driving force behind the group’s technological achievements, such as the development of the mobile operator Tuenti, the TuGo browser and the management of Tokbox, without anyone giving them the desired monetary return.
His strategic vision was also key to the creation of Telefónica Tech, the flagship branch for new revenue generation. He was the first leader of Telefónica IoT & Big Data Tech, positioning the “old operator” as a digital services giant. Until October this year, I supported this vision with the management of Tech operations for critical markets such as the UK, Ireland and Central Europe.
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Higo of the historic political leader and ex-president of Endesa, Rodolfo Martín Villa, Gonzalo says goodbye to Telefónica after having held almost all important positions. His exit leaves an important point in the technical management of the infrastructure sector, but it opens the door to a new stage where his experience in innovation and venture capital will be, as expected, the executor of his next personal projects.
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