Roberto Ruiz is executive vice president of Research, Insights and Analytics at Univision Communications Inc., the leading media company serving Hispanic America. Ruiz leads a team of marketers driving all aspects of marketing, from research to consumer insights to building the business case for brands, leveraging syndicated and custom research tools with the goal of helping advertisers and partners capitalize on the growing U.S. Hispanic population.

Ruiz is a Hispanic marketing expert with more than 20 years of experience in various senior management positions. Throughout his career, he has worked in several industries including financial services, interactive, advertising, consulting, startups and packaged goods.

Prior to joining Univision in 2008, Ruiz served as the founder and president of Consumer Contacts, a boutique consulting firm specializing in Hispanic marketing. Previously, he was a founding partner at The Vidal Partnership, a Hispanic advertising agency in New York. He was one of four partners that took the business from a mid-size agency to a powerhouse recognized twice by Ad Age as agency of the year. At Vidal, Ruiz worked on accounts such as DirecTV, Century21 Real Estate, MasterCard, Diageo and Cingular Wireless. Prior to that role, Ruiz worked at Prodigy Internet and led the team that launched the first fully bilingual Internet Service Provider targeting Hispanics in the US. Ruiz also previously worked at MCI Communications Inc., where he held management positions in direct response, telemarketing and international marketing targeting Hispanic consumers in the US and Latin America and MoneyGram, where he led the Mexico and Latin America money transfer business.

His began his career in marketing and advertising in Venezuela, where he received his classic marketing training working in consumer packaged goods at Pillsbury, Gillette and Mavesa. He also led the strategic planning group at one of the top ad agencies in the country, ARS/DDB, where he worked on the international marketing side of the business.

Ruiz is actively engaged in speaking at trade conferences, including the Association of American Advertising Agencies, The Direct Marketing Association, the Consumer Healthcare Product Association, Nielsen’s Consumer 360, among others. He also collaborated with author Chiqui Cartagena in writing “Hispanic Boom: A guide for Hispanic Marketers.”

Ruiz holds an MBA in International Business and a MA in International Economics from The George Washington University and a Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Universidad Central de Venezuela.