Ana Arias Urones

I'm currently the Head of Global Strategy for Envision Group, a position I started in January 2024. My role involves identifying strategic locations around the world to open new gigafactories for electric vehicle batteries, electrolyzers for hydrogen plants, and artificial intelligence solutions for energy equipment. What we do is produce technology that allows, for example, a battery from an EV car to communicate with a solar panel or electrolyzer facility to monitor the best solution for grid access. I negotiate with governments, secure access to finance, and work through regulatory frameworks to make these renewable energy projects profitable from a business, financial, and regulatory point of view. Before this, I worked for almost two and a half years in the economic office of the Prime Minister in Spain, where I was in charge of international relations and managing European Union Next Generation Funds. My role was to identify projects around the world that could be interesting to invest in Spain, attending events like Davos and United Nations conferences, meeting with other Prime Minister counterparts to attract technology and renewable energy investments. I spent several years with the Inter-American Development Bank based in Washington, D.C., where one of my most significant projects was developing an industrial park in Haiti. I coordinated the entire initiative, working with the government to improve regulations, collaborating with the U.S. Congress and companies like Walmart to create employment. That project became a reality and employed more than 3,000 women, which I consider the most important milestone in my career because of the impact on women and the country. I've been in the field of foreign direct investment attraction since 2004. My career began after finishing my college and master's degrees when I worked for the European Commission in Brussels, then moved to Bangladesh to work with Ericsson. That's where I started combining foreign direct investment, anchor projects in developing countries, and access to energy, which became the foundation of my professional focus.