Grupo Cisneros

Organización Cisneros

Type	Private Company
Industry	Media, entertainment, telecommunications, consumer products and tourism
Founder(s)	Diego Cisneros
Headquarters	Coral Gables[1]
Area served	United States Venezuela Spain Dominican Republic Colombia Peru Ecuador Chile China
Key people	Gustavo Cisneros (Chairman) and Adriana Cisneros (CEO, Vice Chairman and Vice President of Strategy)
Subsidiaries	Venevision Venevision + Plus Novelisima ViendoMovies Venevision International Venevision Productions Venevision Studios Miss Venezuela Vene Music Siente Music RedMas Cuponidad Tropicalia SAECA Travel and Tourism Fisa Laboratories Americatel
Website	www.cisneros.com
References: Venevision Studios in Miami

Cisneros (Organización Cisneros in Spanish) is a conglomerate of companies belonging to the Venezuelan entrepreneur Gustavo Cisneros, who has stakes primarily in Venezuela, Latin America, the U.S. and Canada. It runs companies involved in entertainment, digital media, real estate investment, tourism development and consumer product companies in the world. Through its companies and associations, the company claims to have more than 550 million Spanish and Portuguese-speaking customers in the Americas and Europe, operating in more than 90 countries in five continents.^[2]

History

Diego Cisneros, founder of the Cisneros Group of Companies

Cisneros was founded in 1929 by Diego Cisneros as a small material transport business. Diego diversified the business and in 1961 acquired a television channel which would become Venevision. Gustavo Cisneros, his son, began his career in media and entertainment operations of the company. In 1970, he assumed the position of Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Cisneros and over a short period he strengthened Cisneros’ internationalization.^[3] By 1985, Cisneros was the largest private corporate group in Latin America, consisting of some 50 companies and 35,000 employees.^{[citation needed]} He oversaw the creation of Venevision International, which handles the distribution, marketing and production of entertainment content.

Venevision is currently one of the main programming suppliers for Univision, the leading Spanish-language television network in the United States. Gustavo Cisneros is currently Chairman of the Board at Cisneros. Parallel to company dealings, Gustavo Cisneros and his wife Patricia Phelps de Cisneros, founded the Cisneros Foundation, a private non-profit organization committed to improving education in Latin America. It supports various important educational initiatives designed to promote freedom of speech, economic development and encourage multicultural understanding.

In August 2013, Gustavo Cisneros appointed his daughter Adriana Cisneros de Griffin as the new Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Cisneros.^[4] Adriana has spent the last seven years working as Vice Chairman and Vice President of Strategy. During this time, Adriana Cisneros led the company’s expansion into the digital world and e-commerce.^[5] The company is currently exploring new development possibilities within the digital world, social media networks and synergies between its companies.

Companies

The companies belonging to Cisneros^[6] include majority and minority stock interests in several corporations that are managed both directly or indirectly through partnerships, risk-sharing companies or alliances.^[7] Cisneros’ companies are grouped into the following corporate divisions:

1. Cisneros Media

Cisneros’ business unit which supervises all of its interests in the media and entertainment, which is concentrated on the growing Hispanic market in the United States, Latin America, Europe and Asia. The following companies form part of this unit:

Free-to-air and paid television channels

• Venevision: The main private television network in Venezuela and the largest television producer of Spanish language content in Latin America.

• Venevisión+Plus: A subscription channel distributed internationally that offers 250 hours a month ^{[citation needed]} of programming in Spanish. Venevision Plus currently has presence throughout Latin America in its various formats.
• VmasTV: Subscription channel for entertainment of the Colombian public, with various genres and formats, such as: drama, reality shows, comedy shows, and contests.^[8]
• VePlus TV (previously Novelísima): A soap opera and entertainment channel with diverse programming such as talk shows, variety shows and comedy programs.^[9]

Content and distribution

• Venevision International: is an entertainment company with more than 30 years’ experience in Spanish content distribution produced by Cisneros and other companies.

• Venevision Productions is the largest independent production Hispanic company in the United States,^{[citation needed]} with programming distributed in over 90 countries.^{[citation needed]}
• Venevision Studios is a facility for the production of television programming. It has three studios consisting of over 26,000 square meters, digital cameras, digital AES, which has the ability to produce programs for high-definition TV.^{[citation needed]}

Entertainment and music

• Miss Venezuela: Classified as the most successful local company at the international level during the nineties, this company is devoted to highlighting the beauty of Venezuelan women and the country’s prestige across the four corners of the globe. It has transformed Miss Venezuela into one of the most renowned beauty pageants due to the number of results at the international level. The Miss Venezuela beauty pageant is now a multimedia event which encourages public interaction. The Interactive Gala is a highly anticipated event each year in which the public can vote for their preferred candidate through social media networks. In 2013, the Miss Venezuela contest partnered with CIC Media and Sony Entertainment to create a reality show titled “Todo por  la Corona” [All For the Crown] which was broadcast by Univision across Latin America. Similarly, in 2013 it also partnered with P&G to create pan-regional product and work with 30 brands.
• VeneMusic: A record label which produces, promotes and distributes Latin music of various genres, including television theme songs from Cisneros TV productions. VeneMusic offers the work of new Latin artists, new releases by famous stars, and compilations.

• Siente Music: A joint venture between Vene Music and Universal Music Latino, the award winning division of Universal Music Group. The record label was created in May 2006 and makes good use of the resources provided by these two global entertainment leaders.

2. Cisneros Interactive

A corporate division of Cisneros dedicated to developing digital businesses for Hispanic audiences in the United States and Latin America. Its business strategy is focused on two main areas: digital publicity, both online and mobile, and e-commerce. Its main companies are:

• RedMas: One of the main Hispanic mobile ad networks and mobile studio.^[10] It offers its current and potential clients mobile design and development strategies for building mobile web sites in HTML5 and mobile applications for different operating systems such as Android, IOs, Windows, Symbian and tablets.
• Adsmovil: The main mobile publicity network in the Hispanic communications market in the U.S. and the Spanish and Portuguese-speaking markets in Latin America.^[11]
• Cuponidad: is a e-commerce website with daily sales offers in Colombia, Peru and Venezuela.^[12]

3. Cisneros Real Estate

Cisneros’ real estate division is in charge of developing and positioning the company’s real estate investments which include commercial, industrial and residential properties located in various countries.

• Tropicalia: is a socially responsible and low environmental impact tourism real-estate development belonging to Cisneros. It is located in the El Seibo Province of the Dominican Republic. Tropicalia is a long term sustainable project involving thousands of coastal hectares in the southern costs of the Samana Bay. It aspires to become of the most luxurious destinations in the Caribbean.^[13]

4. Consumer Products and Services

• SAECA Viajes y Turismo: is one of the most important corporate level travel agencies in Venezuela. It offers quality services to its clients, including delivery of tickets and traveler assistance in 125 countries,^{[citation needed]} access to the online Sabre reservations system and call center service in the United States, Europe and Latin America.* Laboratorios Fisa: manufactures and distributes personal beauty products and cosmetics in Venezuela. Its manufacturing lines includes hair care, soaps and deodorants, skin care products and fragrances for men and women.

• Americatel: Founded in April 1993, Americatel Sistemas de Comunicación C.A. has been one of the main players in the Venezuelan market for long-distance telecommunications. It offers corporate clients in Venezuela a "trunking" communication service, employing technology developed by Motorola, Inc. that allows a large number of users to share a relatively small number of communication paths. Americatel’s service is currently offered in Caracas, La Guaira, Maracay, Valencia, Puerto Ordaz and Maturín.

References

External links

• The Cisneros Group of Companies
• Cisneros: A Change of Guard, Latinvex, Sept. 4, 2013