Josu Jon Imaz

Josu Jon Imaz San Miguel is a politician, executive and scientist from Zumarraga, Basque Autonomous Community, Spain, born in 1963. He is CEO of the oil company Repsol. Doctor in Chemical Sciences from the University of the Basque Country. He pursued a political career in the Basque National Party since the early 1990s until the mid-2000s, as an MEP, spokesperson of the Basque autonomous government, and chairman of the party, succeeding Xabier Arzalluz. Josu Jon Imaz San Miguel has a PhD in Chemical Sciences from the University of the Basque Country. He graduated from the Faculty of Chemical Sciences in San Sebastian. He received the Extraordinary Prize of Degree. He specialised in Polymers. He received training in Business Management in 1989–1990, as part of the Ikasbide General Management Training Plan of the Mondragón Cooperative Group. He completed his PhD dissertation at the Higher Institute of Industrial Engineering in Bilbao (1994). In December 1986 he was sent by the INASMET Technology Centre to the French CETIM centre, having received a grant from the Ministry of Industry and Energy as part of their overseas training programme for researchers. Manager of the Composites and Polymers Unit of INASMET from 1987 to 1989. He joined the Mondragón Cooperative Group from 1989 to 1991 as an industrial developer. Manager of the Marketing and External Relations Department of INASMET from 91 to 94. After time off spent in politics, he resumed his academic career as a visiting researcher at the Harvard Kennedy School. In 2008 he returned to the business world as president of Petronor, a Repsol group company headquartered in Muskiz, near Bilbao. In 2010 he became director of Repsol's New Energies Unit with the aim of identifying opportunities, developing projects and carrying out business initiatives in areas such as bioenergy and renewable energy for transport. In 2012 he became a member of Repsol's executive committee, as executive director of the Industrial and New Energies Unit.