This year, 11 marketing and communications executives are being honored in the Leading Women Ecuador program, in association with Adlatina. These standout players join a group—previously known as Women to Watch—of professional women, all of whom make an impact on the Ecuadorian market.

Ad Age welcomes this outstanding group of executives as they join the hundreds of women around the world who have been recognized as Leading Women.

An event to celebrate this year's class of honorees will be held at Banker's Club in Guayaquil on Thursday, Aug. 25.

Catalina Chiriboga

Creative director, Pinktate

Involved in advertising since she was 17 years old, Chiriboga was creative director in many ad agencies working on campaigns that won international recognitions. Then she moved into the marketing world. Convinced that brands must have a real purpose and the strength of a storytelling can save lives, she currently serves as the executive director of Pinktate, a campaign to generate awareness about detecting breast cancer early.

Pinktate has diversified into events, communications and a brand lab named Cookieteria, where the organization uses gourmet cookies to remind people of the benefits of the self-examination with the slogan, "Tocate las cookies!"

Caroline Grijalva Garcés

Business director, Nestlé Nutrition Ecuador

Grijalva Garcés is commercial engineer with a masters in commercial and marketing direction from the University of Barcelona. She has been part of the Women Executive Program at INCAE and has a certificate in digital strategies. She began her career working in many areas—in 2000 she started in the pharmaceutical industry, working for different companies and in many roles and positions. Ten years ago she moved to Nestlé where she focuses on infant nutrition.

Soledad Hermosa

General manager, Wavemaker Ecuador

Hermosa is an advertiser from UTE with a degree in strategic marketing management from UTPL (Universidad Técnica Particular de Loja) and a masters in digital marketing from IEBS. She has 23 years of experience, always connected to media planning. Quality of service has been her priority and her teams have garnered the highest qualifications in local and global customer assessments.

She began her career at FCB, moved to WPP and then served as as media director at NorlopWT before she landed a leadership role at Mindshare when it opened its doors in 2005. It was there that she established a bond in key client management and became regional manager in 2007. In 2010 she opened Wavemaker operations as general manager.

Silvana Kalil

Marketing manager, Ecuavisa

After 25 years of working at some of the most important ad agencies in the country, Kalil decided to work on connecting brands to people. Currently she works in this new form of advertising having joined Ecuavisa to help transform the traditional channel into a multiplatform communication media company that connects people with content where brand can be main characters.

Alexandra Ortiz

Account director, Commonwealth McCann

Ortiz has an advertising degree and 20 years of experience; she started her career as an account manager at McCann, handling bank and mass-market accounts. After serving as an account supervisor, she was elevated to director and selected to be part of Commonwealth McCann to manage the General Motors and Chevrolet accounts.

She focuses on multidisciplinary projects integrating offline and digital strategies to cover the needs and goals of the business. She also has experience working with teams and regional clients.

Maria Gabriela Quezada Sierra

Marketing manager Semvra

Quezada Sierra earned a degree in commercial engineering at Universidad Técnica Federico Santa Maria. She has more than 15 years of experience in mass-market companies. Although she began her career in finance, in 2011 she began her journey in marketing, working on alcoholic beverage brands such as Pony Malta, Manantial, Club Premium, Corona, Budweiser, Stella Artois, Pilsener Light and Pilsener. In 2021, she moved into the food industry, where just 15 months later she became the leader of the marketing department in Semvra, overseeing the Facundo and Chiveria brands.

Desiree Roca Pesantes

Marketing manager, LG Electronics Ecuador

Roca Pesantes is passionate about marketing and has more than 19 years in the industry. She became marketing manager for LG Electronics in October 2020, responsible for developing communication and positioning strategy in Ecuador.

She built her professional career in multinational companies such as The Clorox Company, Unilever and Skretting, developing a valuable understanding of not only the Ecuadorian consumer but also consumers from Latin America, the Middle East and other countries. She studied IT engineering and business management at Universidad Federico Santa María and has a degree in business management from IDE and another degree in marketing management from Tecnológico de Monterrey.

Sabrina Sánchez Paz y Miño

Marketing manager South Andean, Pepsico

Sánchez Paz y Miño studied commercial engineering at the Pontificia Universidad Católica of Ecuador and has a masters in marketing management from the Universidad Adolfo Ibañez of Chile.

She started her professional career in Ecuadorian companies. In 2007 she joined Bayer and won a Gold Effie. In 2014 she moved to PepsiCo as marketing manager where she was awarded one of the company's most important honors, the “Kendall Award,” given for three years in a row of sales and participation in the market. In 2019 she became marketing manager for Peru and Bolivia, in 2021 this expanded to the South Andean region and in May 2022 she was elevated to oversee the nutrition and cookies businesses.

Pierangela Sierra

Co-founder and CEO, Tipti

Sierra has experience in the corporate world in national and international strategic planning, marketing, business development models and the implementation of disruptive commercial initiatives.

Together with Rafael Luque, she impacted the Ecuadorian industry by creating the e-commerce company Tipti, a digital sales platform for supermarkets, easing millions of consumer lives.

Currently, she is an ambassador for e-Trade for Women in Latin America and the Caribbean, an ONU initiative. She is VP of the board of the American Ecuadorian trade chamber, an EXXMA Speaker and Endeavour Entrepreneur.

Sandra Terranonva Ponce

Marketing manager, Ecusal

Passionate about brands, Terranova Ponce has more than 16 years of professional experience in mass-market companies, leading teams and projects in marketing, trade marketing, exports and R&D.

Currently, she is responsible for the marketing and commercial strategies of Ecuasal's domestic and international markets. She turned a commodity product into an interactive boom for consumers, breaking paradigms in a category that was not relevant globally. This led to Cris-Sal being named a Cannes Lions nominee in 2022. She has led business units of Tonicorp, Arca Continental and Coca-Cola.

Mariuxi Zea

Marketing and innovation director, PICA (Plásticos Industriales C.A.)

Zea is passionate about innovation and brand value, and has more than two decades of experience. She worked at Shell and as a professor at ESPOL. Currently, she is a director at PICA, an emblematic Ecuadorian company where she sets development goals and profitability.