The Government has proposed Carlos Ocaña Orbis to occupy a position on the board of directors of Telefónica representing the State Society of Industrial Participations (Sepi). For now, the meeting of the governing body that will be held this Wednesday will endorse this decision, by virtue of the 6.169% of the capital currently held by the investment arm of the Government.
The appointment of the new director of Telefónica will occur by co-option, which entails the departure of the independent Carmen García de Andrés, as elEconomista.es has been able to find out. With this movement, which must be formally approved at the shareholders’ meeting, the SEPI will have its first advisor in Telefónica after the return of the State to the telecom company. Carlos Ocaña is a member of the Digital Transformation Committee at Prisa, and was general director of the Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Commerce between 2008 and 2011, reporting to Miguel Sebastián, as well as a member of the board of directors of Red.es, in the same period 2008 and 2011.
As indicated by Sepi in a statement to the CNMV, the business arm of the Government responds with this foray into telecom to the agreement of the Council of Ministers of December 19, 2023, where the Executive authorized Sepi to buy shares in the multinational Spanish up to 10% of the capital.
After knowing the latest data on Sepi’s percentage of participation, revealed on April 26, the public company stood out as the multinational’s largest shareholder, ahead of Criteria. In that case, the average price of the telecom securities was 3.9185 euros per share, ten cents more expensive than the 3.80 euros price since December 19.
The intentions of the company chaired by Belén Gualda are not limited to the aforementioned 6% already in its portfolio, but rather aspires to reach double digits, specifically 10%, in order to “provide greater shareholder stability to the company to achieve its objectives and contribute to the protection of the strategic capabilities of a company key in the telecommunications sector and determining in most of the industrial capabilities and areas of knowledge that affect the essential interests of defense and national security,” as justified by the public company.
Co-author of a book by Pedro Sánchez
‘The new Spanish economic diplomacy’ is the title of a book signed by Pedro Sánchez and Carlos Ocaña, published in 2013. In this work, the then PSOE deputy – a year before being elected general secretary of the party – the current president of the Government analyzed the economic relations between states and all types of public and private actors, all of them breeding grounds for the governments’ foreign policy.
