Latin America. GatesAir has bolstered its international sales team with the hiring of Carlos Lira Valdez, an experienced RF sales and engineering professional with extensive knowledge of the CALA broadcast market.
Reporting to David Hopson, CALA's Senior Regional Director, Lira will lead GatesAir's sales and business development efforts in CALA's northern region, which represents the entire territory north of Brazil to Mexico and east to the Caribbean.
Lira has spent nearly his entire 25-year career in the media and entertainment industry, with several positions firmly rooted in the RF space. His experience is comprehensive, having worked on the manufacturing side and with broadcasters over the years, including at TV Azteca, where he launched his career in the broadcast industry. Lira first worked as a support engineer and became familiar with the entire media infrastructure and workflow as a system installer and repair technician. That led him to a position at Harris Corporation in 2011 as a regional presales engineer, working closely with CAL's regional customers to prepare sales proposals and provide technical support for Harris transmitters.
Harris Corporation divested its broadcast division that year, and Harris' broadcast business was reborn as GatesAir. While Lira left after the formation of GatesAir, he is now reacquainted with the business he loved during his four years of hands-on work with technology. In the meantime, he worked his way up the RF chain, spending several years at Rymsa RF and Jampro Antennas while gaining valuable experience in sales management and business development.
He returns to GatesAir with a comprehensive understanding of high-efficiency RF technologies, analog and digital transmission standards, and the dynamics (and opportunities) of CAL's broadcast business at every frontier. He has also spent years building strong business relationships across the region, including with many of GatesAir's regional channel partners.
"GatesAir provides me with two very valuable keys to success: exceptional products and expert partners in the country who offer local support to our customers," said Lira. "There is a tremendous opportunity in CALA to help TV and FM broadcasters upgrade existing broadcast infrastructure and transition from analog broadcasters to digital television systems. CALA is an interesting region given the mix of digital standards being adopted, and GatesAir manufactures high-efficiency, high-performance transmitters to meet everyone's needs."
Looking further ahead, Lira sees an opportunity to advance the GatesAir Intraplex business unit, noting that the adoption of audio over IP at CALA is still in the early stages.
"We are very excited to welcome Carlos to the GatesAir family once again at a time when the broadcast business is taking off across the region," said Hopson. "His experience working with major broadcasters in Mexico and other countries is valuable to GatesAir, our partners, and our end customers, as he understands transition timelines, government regulations, and business cultures that often differ between countries. His experience working with antennas, filters, and auxiliary RF systems allows him to provide a holistic view of the RF chain to customers who are preparing to transition to digital or simply need to upgrade their analog infrastructure. We hope your input will take us further than we already are."
