Albert Cuatrecasas, Engineer of the Year 2022 by the COIT and the AEIT

The Official College of Telecommunications Engineers (COIT) and the Spanish Association of Telecommunications Engineers (AIT) has awarded the 2022 Engineer of the Year Award, which pays tribute to professionals who celebrate 50 years of profession, to Albert Cuatrecasas.

"If I am born again, I will study telecommunications again." These were some of the first words of Albert Cuatrecasas when his election as Engineer of the Year 2022 was announced during the celebration of San Gabriel. Cuatrecasas' extensive and intense career has earned him this award that rewards a lifetime dedicated to Telecommunications. Since his beginnings as a student at the ESITB of the Polytechnic University of Catalonia, he has combined his studies with working as a computer scientist for the Personnel Department of the University of Barcelona.

Recently graduated, he joined the Organizing Committee of the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games as head of sound at the Real Club de Polo de Barcelona Olympic equestrian venue. "From the Olympics I take with me the passion of all the collaborators and volunteers, the drive and enthusiasm for a project, and that is how I have tried to apply it in my professional life from now on, very important!", Cuatrecasas declares about this episode of his career professional.

Later he joined the International Commercial Department of Abengoa-Sainco Tráfico, an entity from which he "sold Spanish technology to China, something difficult to imagine today", according to his words. In that company he trained and worked very intensely: "Honestly, it was a personal experience of which I am very proud and happy."

With the explosion of the '.com' he entered the Cluster Competitiveness Consulting. Shortly after, he would begin his journey, which still continues today, since he was part of the team that studied investments in telecommunication infrastructures at ACESA Telecom.

in the current Cellnex Telecom, Cuatrecasas has held various important positions during these 22 years. From the head of Institutional Relations in its beginnings to the current CEO of Cellnex Spain, having previously held the positions of deputy manager of Territorial Business and director of Global Business.

Cuatrecasas is in charge of an infrastructure operator with more than 137,000 towers in 12 European countries, a success achieved thanks to "anticipation through the neutral operator model, attention to both organic business and inorganic opportunities, taking care of the service customers and, above all, maintain the illusion as the first day”, as he himself recounts.

During his thank you speech, Cuatrecasas has indicated that there are four forces in nature: gravitation, electromagnetism, the weak nuclear force and the strong nuclear force. “And we are one of these four forces, bringing its practical application to society, an increasingly better and more connected society,” he added.

In the last two editions of this award, which has been given since 1999, Roberto Sánchez, Secretary of State for Telecommunications and Digital Infrastructures (2021), and Félix Pérez, director of the Higher Technical School of Telecommunications Engineers of Madrid (ETSIT) were recognized. ) of the UPM (2020).

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