Mauricio Gonzalez-Sfeir, based in Bolivia and the United States, is an executive leader with extensive experience and responsibilities in both the private and public sectors and in academia. This includes functional expertise in corporate strategy, the successful development of large investment projects, organizational strengthening, sustainability, and Mergers and Acquisitions. He is a motivated team player with quality knowledge on the development and execution of ambitious business strategies, short term goals, and long-term objectives. He is an acknowledged disruptor of underperforming assets to increase growth, financial health, and productivity. 

Besides co-founding Cereus Capital Partners, he serves on the faculty and as Executive-in-Residence with the Dominican University Brennan School of Business. His academic experience also includes serving as Associate Dean at the University of Illinois Gies College of Business and as a faculty member of the Universidad Catolica Boliviana, and Milliken University.

Upon conclusion of his university studies, including his MBA degree from Harvard Business School, his BA in Economics from Yale University and his MPhil studies at Oxford University as a Marshall Scholar, Mr. Gonzalez-Sfeir joined the London office of the Boston Consulting Group, where he was a Manager. During his career with BCG, he worked on strategic development and mergers and acquisitions assignments for European and United States-headquartered food and agro-industrial companies, including market entry via acquisition into Brazil.

Following BCG, Mr. Gonzalez-Sfeir returned to Bolivia accepting an invitation from the Government of Bolivia to serve as Vice Minister of Energy and Hydrocarbons. He then went on to work as a consultant for the World Bank and as Executive Vice President of Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales Bolivianos, before returning to the
private sector as CEO of a hydrocarbons exploration company, Pan Andean Resources PLC.

Mr. Gonzalez-Sfeir later returns to the public sector as Chairman and CEO of Bolivia’s largest company, Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales Bolivianos. Duringhis tenure, he led the development and financial closing of the Bolivia-Brazil natural gas pipeline, the largest energy infrastructure project ever carried out between two countries in Latin America. He was later invited to become the Minister of Energy and Hydrocarbons/National Energy Secretary of Bolivia where he led the energy sector to unprecedented growth in the production and exporting of natural gas. During this time, he organized and Co-chaired the first Sustainable Energy Summit of the Americas of Ministers of Energy of the Americas, held in 1997 in Santa Cruz-Bolivia, together with the United States Department of Energy.

Following his work with Bolivia’s government, Mr. Gonzalez-Sfeir returns to the private sector, serving as CEO of several medium sized companies in Bolivia and Peru, including Pan Andean Resources Peru, Hydrocarbon Exploration PLC, Clontarf Energy PLC, Petrolex SA, and La Paz FC. During this time he also served on the boards of New York Stock Exchange-listed Compania Boliviana de Energia Electrica (COBEE), Clontarf Energy PLC, Hidroelectrica Andina, and of the Association of Latino Professionals for America (the largest Hispanic professionals organization in the United States), delegate to the Yale University Alumni
Association, the Harvard Business School Latino Alumni Association, and the Bolivia Football Federation (Federacion Boliviana de Futbol).

Recently, Mr. Gonzalez-Sfeir founded and led a United States-based company, Illinois Latin America LLC, with a strategy of matching innovative, impactful technologies of United States companies with market opportunities in Latin America. The focus was on generating strategic partnerships, marketing and distribution agreements, and joint ventures in the food, agro-industry, energy, digital media and agriculture sectors.