They have attended specialized seminars at the Faculty of Economics and Business, visited companies and shared their experiences with students from the Master’s Degree in Entrepreneurship and Innovation

A total of 22 students of the Master’s Degree in Business Administration (MBA) from the University of Texas at El Paso (Mexico) are studying at the URV from the 18 to 23 March through the Study Abroad programme to gain first-hand knowledge about the reality of economic activity in the southern region of Catalonia. They will do this by attending specialized seminars taught by the Faculty of Economics and Business and by visiting different companies. This Tuesday they shared their impressions with the students of the Master’s Degree in Entrepreneurship and Innovation from the URV and senior students of the Business Administration and Management degree with an activity based on speed dating.

One the one hand, they had the chance to explain the business ideas they were working on to each other in small groups. On the other hand, they discussed the differences between their countries regarding entrepreneurship and innovation, industrialization and the incidence of cultural diversity in business management, among other issues. For Alejandro Baca, general director of a dental clinic in Ciudad Juarez and an MBA student at the University of Texas at El Paso, the programme is “an incredible opportunity to exchange knowledge and understand the differences in our mentalities, which influence ideas of innovation and our growth as a society. ”

Their visit has also allowed them to see projects in action similar to those that they work on in class. For example, for one of her subjects one of the students had to devise a start-up for a wine producer. Consequently, she found it particularly helpful to visit the Clos Galena Winery, which exports its products to several countries and provides wine to events such as the Nobel Prize Award Ceremonies, among others.

According to Beatriz Lucero, a staff member from the University of Texas who accompanies the students, the visit to the headquarters of the Borges Group allowed them to see that it is an agri-food company similar to the ones in the border region between Mexico and US. They have also visited Port Aventura and the Eureca facilities, in this case to see how research-project spin-offs are created.

Amado Alarcón, professor at the Department of Business Management and responsible for this international course, says that through its participation in the Study Abroad programme, the Faculty of Economics and Business strengthens the exchange relationship that already existed between the URV and the University of Texas at El Paso, which until now mainly consisted of visits by URV faculty members to Mexico.