Maria Fernandez Guajardo

Maria Fernandez Guajardo is a transformative product executive and entrepreneur with an extensive history of innovation in the tech industry. Maria has guided companies of all sizes, from startups to giants like Meta and Google, in bringing cutting-edge products for consumer and B2B to market at a global scale. Her recent book, Sail to Scale: Steer Your Startup Clear of Mistakes from Launch to Exit, offers vital insights for entrepreneurs. Presently, Maria serves as a Senior Director of Product Management at Google, leading the product team at Gmail, enhancing user productivity with AI innovations. As a product executive at Meta, Maria oversaw the transformation of Facebook's video and audio consumer offerings. There she also funded and led “VR for Work” metaverse applications which brought Oculus virtual reality into the productivity and corporate realm. Before that, Maria held the position of Vice President of Product at Clear Labs and RetailNext, focusing on food genomics and pioneering computer vision-based retail analytics, respectively. Maria holds a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering and began her career as a silicon engineer at Cadence Design Systems followed by holding varied engineering and business roles at Texas Instruments in France and the U.S. Maria is committed to promoting diversity through her non-profit engagements. She founded the Silicon Valley Club de Ejecutivas Españolas and served on the board of STEM non-profit Ignited Education. Maria has been recognized as one of the top 40 leaders in the Bay Area by the Silicon Valley Business Journal and as a top Latino influence in tech by CNET.