Keynote: How is Mexico fostering the “Innovation Global Wave: public & private endeavours”.
Teresa de León Zamora is the Director of Technology Commercialisation at CONACYT, the National Science and Technology Council in Mexico. Her main responsibilities are the interaction with different governmental ministries and agencies, as well as with the academic, scientific and private sectors in Mexico and internationally, to design public policy and funding programs to support innovation that will enhance a knowledge-base economy in Mexico.
Teresa has a Masters degree (MSTC) in Science and Technology Commercialisation from the Advanced Materials CONACYT Research Center in Mexico (CIMAV), jointly with the IC2 from the University of Texas in Austin, and an MBA from the Universidad de las Américas Puebla.
Teresa de León has spent the majority of her professional career within the science and technology sector in Mexico. She worked for 16 years at the National Institute for Astrophysics, Optics and Electronics (INAOE) in different positions, amongst which she was the Head Coordinator of the Technology Transfer activities and the Project Manager for the Large Millimeter Telescope Alfonso Serrano, the world´s largest single-dish millimeter wavelength telescope, and one of the largest and most important scientific infrastructures in the country.
Within CONACYT she leads a number of major programs including: i) International Cooperation for Science, Technology and Innovation projects between Mexico and the science and technology agencies in France, Israel, UK, Spain, Germany and the USA, and; ii) the Innovation Technology Fund in collaboration with the Mexican Ministry of Economy.
To support these professional responsibilities she conducts research into the implementation of national policies to correct market failures in order to accelerate Mexico´s competitiveness through a knowledge-base economy, whilst promoting entrepreneurship and technology innovation, leading to new market supply and demand initiatives to create high innovative products and services with social impact.