​​​​Luiz G. Duarte​

   In a career that spans two decades, the first realization is that no bio or resume can totally encompass my breadth of experiences. That is why I have meticulously captured a lot of that experience in a full online vitae.

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   Brazilian-native, Luiz had a variety of professional experiences while studying Journalism in Brazil. He has worked in advertising agencies, worked as a reporter for Folha de S. Paulo (largest newspaper in the country) and Abril Publishing (largest publishing group in Latin America), served as public relations for large firms like Alcan Aluminum and others, and even produced institutional videos. His interest for the electronic media and new communication technologies brought him to Michigan in 1990 for a Master's degree in Telecommunication by Michigan State University (MSU).

   His Master's thesis was turned into a book on pay-TV that has become mandatory reading back in Brazil for Communications college students. He has returned many times to his country to offer lectures on various topics and also collaborate with the trade press. He continued his education by focusing on the International Marketing strategies of Telecom firms. He pursued a Ph.D. degree at MSU that was mostly composed of MBA courses geared toward international marketing management. Upon the completion of his last doctoral course in 1996, he was recruited right out of college by DIRECTV. The satellite television technology had just been deployed in the U.S. and the company was interested in new talent with the language and technical skills to help launch the service in Latin America.

   Luiz was on the ground floor of the DIRECTV venture in California, starting in the Engineering Department as a main liaison to the Brazilian telecasting. He hired and trained over 60 technicians to perform various duties in centers across the continent. His team captured data that yielded key performance indexes for the company, based on which upper management bonus was calculated. He was actively engaged in the company customer loyalty efforts and helped build a research group with over $1 million dollars in budget to execute numerous qualitative and quantitative studies throughout the region. He helped form a network of intelligence executives within the company, who collected strategic information and shared through a networked CI system implemented by Luiz.

   Before the company was acquired, Luiz also helped build call centers in Argentina and Florida, designing and implementing software to collect survey data and analyze it through SPSS software. After almost six years at DIRECTV, Luiz then took on a couple of projects aimed at the U.S. market. The first was the launch of Telefutura, the last broadcast network to be launched in America. Telefutura is owned by the Univision Group and is aimed at U.S. Hispanics. Luiz participated in the negotiations with Nielsen to acquire ratings data for the new network, hired and trained ratings analysts and implemented the computer systems to register programming schedules and report on performances. His analyses contributed to the formulation of early program schedules in the network.

   As Telefutura was successfully launched in 2001, Luiz accepted a position as Director of Research at WGBH, the Boston TV/Radio station responsible for most of the public television productions on radio, TV and Web. Luiz rebuilt a research department, recycling staff, implementing new technologies and reports. Due to family reasons, he ended up returning to Florida with Sony Pictures Television International in 2003. As Director of Marketing & Research, Luiz filled a totally new position within the company, merging market data with marketing strategies for Latin America for the first time. He recruited, hired and trained managers for both areas and developed standard operating procedures for interfaces with various departments throughout the continent. He collaborated with the industry associations to implement new research and became the first client to the DIRECTV ratings service that he had initially designed while working at that company.

   In 2004, Luiz took flight on his own, joining a winning team of marketing consultants in Fort Lauderdale. At Starmark International, Luiz created programs to track the efficiency of marketing campaigns using new technologies and concepts. When TiVo, the pioneer digital video recording company, started plans to launch a new TV audience service based on its clickstream data, Luiz was recruited to design the initial reports and guide engineers on the deployment of a top-notch syndicated ratings service. Stop||Watch launched in 2006 with Starcom, IPG and many important clients added all the time. He received an award from Advertising Research Foundation for the development of the first timeshifted ratings in the country.

 

   In 2008, after 7 years away, Luiz returned to DIRECTV to launch the first RPD audience ratings service of Latin America. He also organized a new corporate research department with projects totaling over US$8 million/year. During his latest 10-year span at the company, he worked for Engineering, Programming, Ad Sales and Marketing departments, with a wide variety of projects under his belt. His last big project for the Ad Sales Department, included a complete reorganization of systems and procedures to more than double inventory capacity and sales potentials.

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   After the DIRECTV acquisition, reorganization and sale by AT&T, Luiz moved back to Florida to teach at the University of Central Florida and launch his own consulting group. As the head of Cense Group, he supported TechEdge ratings analytics company and manages various other projects. More recently, he headed Marketing Analytics for A&E Networks, incorporating many new digital video insights.

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