designer manager industrial designer
Luis Francisco Wu Linares was born on December 4, 1966, in Columbia, Missouri, United States. His professional career developed principally in Colombia, where he worked across industrial design, construction materials, manufacturing, product development, marketing, and corporate management. His work has included commercial operations extending into Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia, and other international markets.
Wu Linares studied industrial design at University Jorge Tadeo Lozano, completing his professional training from 1986 to 1991. He later pursued postgraduate business education at the Universidad de los Andes, completing a specialization in markets from 1997 to 1998 and a Master of Business Administration from 2000 to 2002. This combination of design training and management education supported his subsequent transition from product development and research into marketing, international business, and general management.
Wu Linares began his professional career as manager of Dossi Dosso from 1991 to 1993, where he participated in the start-up of the business, developed maquila operations, established company-owned stores, supported exports, and assumed responsibility for commercial, financial, and production operations. He then joined Fiberglass Colombia, first as research and development manager from 1993 to 1997 and later as marketing and research manager from 1998 to 2001. At Fiberglass Colombia he worked on production-process improvements, new-product development, market research, product coding for retail channels, marketing strategy, distributor and end-customer relations, and the management of research, development, and innovation activities. His documented design work included a patented recessed-edge ceiling system and the MBI installation system. From 2001 to 2002, Wu Linares was product manager for the Andean region at Hilti Colombia, covering Colombia, Peru, and Venezuela and working on product introduction, market-share growth, sales support, and the management of product lines. He served as general manager of Global Traders from 2002 to 2003, overseeing supermarket and institutional sales and relationships with represented brands. From 2003 to 2004, he was commercial manager for Central America, the Caribbean, and Asia at Lamitech, where he directed commercial strategy for markets including Panama, Costa Rica, Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Aruba, Singapore, and China. Wu Linares served as general manager of Sinteco from 2004 to 2008, directing the company and developing strategic business alliances, including a new thermoformed blister-packaging business. From 2009 to 2014, he was director general of Toolcraft Colombia, where he directed the establishment and operation of the company in Colombia and Peru, developed its strategic and commercial plans, expanded distribution, and oversaw a business with reported sales exceeding US$10 million. He subsequently served as director of the construction strategic business unit at Espumlatex from 2015 to 2017, directing a construction-products business and a high-performance elastomer waterproofing development project undertaken with Dow Chemical for Colombian infrastructure projects. From 2018 to 2020, Wu Linares was general manager of Minminer, directing the company, developing export strategies for new markets, integrating producers, businesses, and communities, and increasing reported coke exports. In 2020 he became general manager of Eternit Colombiana, where he directed three production plants in Colombia, worked on operational restructuring during the quarantine period, pursued export and margin improvements, and reported to regional and corporate management in Mexico.
Designed a recessed-edge ceiling system that was documented as receiving an invention patent.
Designed the MBI installation system.
Directed product-development, research, market-research, and innovation activities at Fiberglass Colombia.
Led the establishment and operation of Toolcraft Colombia in Colombia and Peru, with reported annual sales exceeding US$10 million.
Directed the development of a thermoformed blister-packaging business at Sinteco.
Wu Linares has been recorded as a member of the Construction Specifications Institute and the Asociación Colombiana de Diseñadores, reflecting his involvement in professional construction-specification and design organizations.
Wu Linares is identified in the biographical record as the son of Blanca and Ching. His professional connections include companies and organizations in the industrial-design, construction-materials, manufacturing, mining, and international-trade sectors.
