Claudio Orrego Larraín is the Vice-president of Business Development and e-government of SONDA, Chile´s largest software and IT service provider company. He is responsible for enhancing the company´s presence in Latin American, where SONDA has already 10 country offices. Also, he is responsible for the company´s e-business and e-government strategy for the region.

Prior to this position, he was Minister of Housing and Urban Development and Public Properties in President Lagos´ cabinet (2000), being Chile´s youngest Minister of two portfolios (33). He has also been a consultant in areas of State and Public Management Reform and e-government to countries like Brasil, México, Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Perú, Ecuador and Panamá.

Between 1997 and 1999, Orrego was the Executive Secretary of the Interministerial Committee for Modernizing Public Management. In that position, he was responsible for formulating, implementing and evaluating programs and strategies aimed at modernizing public management and making it more accessible and accountable to the Chilean people.

During that same period of time he was the chief of the State Modernization Division of the Ministry of the Presidency. Under both roles, he was responsible for implementing a three-year strategic plan to improve the quality of service and the transparency of Government. This task included initiatives and policies on human resources, transparency and complaint mechanisms, access to public information and the strategic use of Information Technology. This last goal was accomplished, among other things, through the implementation of a government portal (with more than 400 web sites linked to it), the government on-line procurement system, the public intranet, and the first experience on electronic signature, all of which were under Orrego´s direct supervision and leadership.

During 1996, he was legislative and public management advisor of the minister of Health, and consultant of the InterAmerican Development Bank and the World Bank since 1994. Between 1990 and 1993 he was political and legislative advisor to the Minister of the Presidency.

Between 1996 and 2000, Orrego served as a councilman in the Commune of Peñalolén, one of the poorest boroughs of greater Santiago. In 1999, he created a non-profit corporation called ?El Encuentro? in which local citizens have access to their own public radio station, a micro-business assistance center and the first Internet Community Center of the country, where through a network of 20 connected computers, training and access are secured for the most disadvantaged people.

He has published papers on corruption, State modernization and local governments´ accountability (England, Chile and Bolivia), and Labor Market Flexibility. He also teaches in the Management and Public Policy Master of the Chilean University, in the School of Political Science of the Catholic University, and is member of the international advisory board of ESADE´s one of Spain´s most prestigious MBAs.

Orrego, 35, has a law degree from the Catholic University of Chile´s Law School and Master degree in Public Policy from the Kennedy School of Government of Harvard University. He is married to Francisca Morales, and their three kids: Claudio (9), and the four year old twins Daniel y Sebastián. He loves playing tennis, squash and soccer, reading, playing the guitar, camping and participating in Church.