The Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) is excited to announce Catalina Valencia as our new director of Business Development. Catalina, who has 20 years of professional business development experience in a broad range of settings, joins DEED on September 9 and will lead a team of six business development managers and other support staff who work with companies of all sizes to help them locate and expand in communities across Minnesota.

Catalina comes to DEED from Greenville, South Carolina where she ran her own site selection and economic development consulting firm. Prior to that, she worked for five years as a senior consultant with Global Location Strategies, a global site selection firm.

With local and international business experience, Catalina has previously served as a business development director at a local public/private economic development agency in South Carolina. Prior to that, she was a global aquaculture program manager for the U.S. Soybean Export Council in St. Louis where she expanded the use of soybean products to new global markets. Catalina also worked for the Colombian government as an international consultant and a project manager.

Catalina earned a Master of International Affairs from Columbia University in New York and a Master of International Business from Universidades EAFIT and San Buenaventura in Cali, Colombia. In 2019, she earned a certificate from the Institute for Women's Entrepreneurship at Cornell University.

Catalina is looking forward to starting with DEED on Wednesday. She took the job because Minnesota is well positioned to succeed in the new economy. A great combination of assets helps strengthen the competitive position of the state, and she is excited to be part of that. She has also looked forward to moving her family here because of the quality of education and life that goes along with the address – including great entertainment options, lakes and quality schools.

Given the importance of our business retention, expansion and attraction efforts along with our community engagement efforts, I look forward to adding her expertise to our economic development leadership team, and as a resource to our economic development community.

Welcome, Catalina!