|
THANK YOU
TO OUR AMAZING COMMITTEE!
 Martha
Montoya - Biography
Martha Montoya is a
businesswoman whose imagination,
creative talent, and drive have
always kept her moving forward.
As child born to educators, in
Bogotá, Colombia, Martha began
her professional career as a
teacher of Chemistry, Biology
and English in her native
country.
Upon immigrating to the United
States, Martha developed a
business career in International
Trade, in areas such as
telecommunications, agriculture
and many more, which has helped
her establish herself as a
business leader and community
advocate.
Through out her career in the
U.S. she developed a keen sense
of the market and her experience
selling products and services to
the Hispanic market expands 15
years, during which she worked
with the telecommunications
industry, food and service
industries in various campaigns
that were directed to employees,
manufacturers, suppliers,
retailers consumers and business
community.
Martha has played a central role
in the development of the U.S.
Hispanic market. Among the many
honors she has received include
the Latin Business Association
Latina Entrepreneur of the Year,
Hispanic Businesswoman of the
Year for 2002 by California
Hispanic Chamber of Commerce
among other distinctions she
received the Hispanic Business
2002, and Hispanic Magazine 2003
honoring her as one of the 100
most influential people in the
U.S. market.
In addition she also received
the Film Advisory Board
Cartoonist of the Year Award,
the National Hispanic
Publications Cartoonist Award.
Her latest endeavor is
spearheading the Access to
Business Capital (ABC) Program
for Venture Capital. Recognizing
that access to capital is the
No. 1 issue for business owners,
she took the steps to establish
this program in 2004 and
recruited the support of various
Venture Capitalists and other
institutions with the goal of
not only providing funds for
business, but looking into the
future, to also provide the
tools to integrate research and
education into the program.
Program partners include
prestigious entities such as
Microsoft Corporation, 1st PMF
Bancorp, Fontis Capital, Engage
Capital, Fulcrum Capital,
Nogales Investors, Rosewood
Capital, Yucaipa Corporate
Initiatives Fund, Fontis
Capital, U.S. MBDA, Fortius
Holdings, Palladium Equity and
Comerica.
In addition to the ABC program,
in partnership with the
California Hispanic Chambers of
Commerce, she has invested
thousands of volunteer hours in
the Latin Business Association,
the National Latina Business
Women Association, National
Association of Hispanic
Publications, SHPE Society of
Hispanic Professional Engineers
and advisory board Working
Families for Wal-mart among many
others.
Martha’s main goal in being
active on the boards of the
mentioned organizations is to
assist their leadership create
programs for the Hispanic
business to grow and generate
wealth in the community as well
as to create awareness in the
corporate community of the value
Hispanic businesses bring to
their organizations as vendors
and partners.
However, her passion is to
advocate on behalf of children
for the betterment of their
education, health and future. As
such she actively makes
presentations in schools,
parents’ organizations and
community events on diverse
issues such as science and math,
obesity and health, access to
higher education and other
topics pertaining to kids and
parents. Martha and Los Kitos
have joined ALAS Latin America
in Solidarity Action (ALAS –
America Latina en Accion
Solidaria by their name in
Spanish) to encourage
individuals to improve the
conditions of nutrition, health
and education of Latin American
children with others such as
world renowned artists like
Shakira, Juanes, MANA, Juan Luis
Guerra, Alejandro Sanz and
others as activists to create
awareness of the projects in the
area.
Currently, Martha owns and
directs a unique media
enterprise, Los Kitos
Entertainment LLC, which has
three main divisions. The core
business is the syndication,
through Tribune Media, of the
inspirational Los Kitos
bilingual cartoon strip to over
300 Spanish language newspapers
in the United States having
started in Los Angeles based La
Opinion. A second division is
the licensing of the characters
through United Media Licensing
representing other properties
such as Snoopy, Dilbert and
others with licensees ranging
from Good Humor Ice Cream,
Kidstuff, to State Farm
Insurance, Wal-mart, Kraft; to
assist those companies expand
their presence in the Hispanic
market. The third division of
LKELLC is utilizing the
characters to bring edu-entertainment
to the U.S. Hispanic community.
As a result of Martha’s dynamism
and marketing savvy, Los Kitos
cartoon strip can be read daily
in newspapers worldwide, enjoyed
on the Internet, and heard in
America and abroad through a
daily and weekly segments
broadcast in Univision Radio and
Organization of Americas States.
Her immigration to the United
Status and the lessons learned
of tolerance, patience, respect,
laughter, joy, are at the very
core of the message in the Los
Kitos cartoon strips.
|
