Asturias was a great source of human capital to Mexico and other Latin American countries -in a very intense way between the mid-nineteenth century and the post-civil war-, from which relevant figures emerged in business and the Mexican business movement, linked to the collection of great fortunes and the generation of manufacturing, banking and commercial emporiums. Now, and since the end of the 20th century -although with some previous precedent-, the Principality has become a recipient of capital and investors from beyond the seasand this at the same time that Asturian business groups have expanded and established themselves in the North American country with subsidiaries and production centers.
The announcement made public on Tuesday by which the Mexican corporations Prodi and Mota-Engil Mexico (the latter, with majority Portuguese capital but Mexican management and presidency) will subscribe a capital increase for an amount of up to 90 million in the Asturian engineering company Duro Felguera shows the great importance of this process for the regional economic fabric. This is due to the relevance of the company in which both partners are going to join as dominant shareholders and due to the repercussion of this partnership, both economic and symbolic, in a community in which Duro has been a constant reference for the last 166 years. of the Asturian industrial future. It will be the second time that Duro has foreign shareholding leadership. The previous one was between 1992 and 1997, when the German group Metallgesellschaft became the largest owner with 11.92% of the capital.
Although this phenomenon of attracting Spanish-American capital has not reached the overwhelming proportions that the great exodus of huge waves of young Asturians who joined the American emigration in the past, the process of arrival of investors and capitalist groups from Mexico has accelerated. in recent years, with increasing relevance, not so much determined by the recurrence and number of operations as by the scope of decision-making, the uniqueness of the bets, the conspicuous condition of its protagonists and by the notoriety and social significance – and also emotional in some cases – from the organizations in which they fixed their eyes and put their capitals.
The takeover by Mexican investors of flagship institutions for regional sentiment and identity such as Real Oviedo, with the acquisition of its majority shareholding by Grupo Carso (owned by the wealthy Carlos Slim) at the end of 2012 and its transfer last December July to the also Mexican Grupo Pachuca, and the purchase in June of Real Sporting de Gijón by the also Mexicans of the Orlegi group, are, outside the strict economic sphere -although with a marked corporate and business component-, very significant examples of the interaction that is taking place between the two transoceanic worlds.
In all three cases (Duro Felguera, Real Oviedo and Sporting) there were no prior connections between the investors and the region. Neither was there in the recent decision of Grupo Telecom México (GTM), confirmed in November, to set up its subsidiary Nueva Red Global in Asturias for the deployment of information technologies and fiber optics in rural areas. The group, which also operates in its country in the metalworking, electronics, medicine, telemedicine and catering sectors, aspires to deploy other commercial initiatives in Asturias in the future.
After leaving Real Oviedo, Slim, who in 2014 came to the rescue of the Spanish construction company FCC, continues to operate in the Principality through this company and various subsidiaries and investees domiciled in Asturias.
The forthcoming takeover of Duro Felguera by the Miguel and Prodi families is not the first attempt at the entry of capital into Asturian engineering from the North American country either. In June 2018, the Asturian Álvarez Arrojo family agreed to sell its engineering control shareholding (24%) to the Mexican company Petroza Limited, belonging to the holding company Treza Assets Management. Petroza was led by Mauricio Treviño Zambrano, a member of the wealthy Mexican Zambrano family. The operation was not consummated.
Another of the great interests of the Asturian Álvarez Arrojo family did end up in Mexican power. The bus and coach company Avanza, the second largest in Spain and a competitor of the Asturian Alsa, was sold in 2006 by the Álvarez Arrojo and their partners to the venture capital fund Doughty Hanson & Co., which seven years later transferred it to their current owner, the Mexican group Ado.
It was the time of the beginning of the great arrival of Mexican capital in Spain, which continued with operations of great importance, such as the purchase of the Bimbo baking company in Spain and Portugal by Bimbo México in 2011 –which it also acquired four years later. Panrico–, and that of the Yelmo cinemas (one of them, in Oviedo) by the Mexican Cinépolis in 2015.
return path
Asturian capital in Mexico has also led the return path in some cases. If in the past the investments of Indianos in foundations, schools and public utility works in their region of origin were common, since the second half of the 20th century the destination of these resources has been fundamentally business. The Arangos, natives of Salas and enriched in the Aztec country, were pioneers with the arrival in Spain of the second generation in the 1960s to develop the Aurrerá supermarket and later the successful Mexican concept of Vips. The dynasty sold this restaurant chain in 2018 to a subsidiary of the Mexican conglomerate Alsea (both groups already had an establishment in Asturias at the time) and the Arangos reinvested a part of the economic amount received in the purchase of shares of the resulting company.
The Astur-Mexicans Nozaleda, descendants of emigrants from Cabranes and Nava, returned to Spain in 1981, where they have since promoted more than 30 companies, some of which, such as the Nozar real estate company, with promotions in Gijón, have managed to revive them after the great financial crisis of 2008-2014.
The Mexican banker and industrialist Antonio del Valle Ruiz, grandson of an emigrant from Cangas de Onís, first president of the Association of Asturian Entrepreneurs in Mexico (CEAM-Mexico), did not have the same luck with his large investments starting in 2012 in the Popular Bank. The crisis of this entity in 2017 and its sale for one euro to Santander is still raging in the courts. Del Valle, president of the Kaluz group, maintains his relationship with the Archivo de Indianos, in Colombres, and in his time as a shareholder and director of Popular made exploratory inquiries to locate and, where appropriate, acquire deposits of fluorspar in Asturias to supply material cousin to the multinational chemical company Mexichem (now Orbia), of which it is the owner.
Del Valle was not the only case of Mexican investments in Spanish banking. Ernesto Luis Tinajero Flores (Inmosán) acquired 7.16% of Liberbank in 2014, the bank promoted by Cajastur and continues to be a shareholder of Unicaja after the merger of both entities. Sabadell also captured Mexican capital a year earlier with the entry of David Martínez with 5% (now 3.5%).
The son of a Cabraliego and strongly linked to Asturias and the Asturian community in Mexico, the businessman Tomás Álvarez Aja began in 2013 an investment strategy in Asturias with partners from the region in the wine, agricultural, real estate, hotel and tourism sectors in Cangas de Onís, Parres and Oviedo.
Among those born in Asturias and settled in Mexico, Juan Antonio Pérez Simón from the Llanisco began his investments in the 1980s in eastern Asturias with the algae transformation industry, hotels, concrete and real estate development. Born in Oviedo, businessman José Miguel Fernández Rodríguez acquired ownership of Agua de Fuensanta, from Nava from Mexico in 2014, then in bankruptcy, and has relaunched it with investments and new products.
Antonio Suárez, a native of Oviedo, raised in Gijón and a native of Sobrescobio and Campo de Caso, emigrated to Mexico in 1970 and today is the owner of Grupomar, an organization that owns a large tuna fleet in the Pacific, can factories and canning industry , among other businesses. Suárez has invested in Asturias in recent years, hiring five fishing boats from the Armón shipyard in Gijón; the management of another six for other shipowners, orders for cans from the KPS factory in Llanera (then Mivisa), real estate development in Madrid and Gijón, and support for the Indianos Archive.
Now, the arrival of the Miguel and Mota families to the shareholders of Duro will be able to clear up the uncertainties and vulnerabilities in which the company has been immersed. his public rescue in 2021.