Photo: Google
Named as one of the 20 Most Influential Latinos in Tech for two consecutive years —2017, 2018 by CNET.
Alberto Villarreal is a Creative Leader with two decades of experience in the fields of Industrial Design, Interior Architecture, and Design Strategy. He has led the design of products, spaces, and strategic vision for some of the most influential brands & organizations in the world, reaching millions of users.
Currently as Director of Product Design at TONAL, he leads both Hardware and Software design teams, including the User Experience, User Research, Industrial Design and CMF functions.
Previously, Alberto worked at Google for nearly a decade as Creative Lead in the Consumer Hardware group at the global headquarters in Mountain View, California. Leading a team of industrial designers, his role was centered on the creative direction of Google's mobile computing portfolio, including devices and accessories. His team at Google worked on the design of the highly recognized line of Pixel mobile products (from the first generation Pixel - Phone by Google, through Pixel 7, as well the PixelBook & PixelBook Go laptops).
Before joining Google, he co-founded the award-winning firm AGENT with architect Michel Rojkind in Mexico City, working for high profile clients including The Coca-Cola Company, the Mexican Federal Government, Konica-Minolta, Hewlett-Packard, and Nike among others.
With more than 50 international awards, his work has been recognized with global accolades and some of the most prestigious honors in the design & architecture industries, including: Red Dot Luminary Award, Chicago Athenaeum Good Design Award, iF Hannover Product Design Award and IDSA IDEA Award, among others. His work has been exhibited globally and has received extensive media coverage worldwide.
Photo: Stefan Höderath
Some of Alberto’s relevant speaking engagements include: IDSA Northeast Conference (New York), Shanghai Institute of Visual Arts (Shanghai), Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia (Barcelona), California College of the Arts (San Francisco), United Nations Expert Group Meeting on Sustainable Transportation (Rio de Janeiro), and TEDx (Mexico City).
In 2011 Alberto was included in the list of 11 Most Influential Mexican Entrepreneurs of the year, by Milenio newspaper. He was also featured by ProMexico Magazine as one of the “50 Mexican Names in the Global Creative Scene"
Alberto started his career at automotive-design studios such as Pininfarina (Italy), Johnson Controls Advanced Design (Germany) and Volkswagen Design (Mexico). In 2004 Alberto joined LUNAR where he worked as Senior Lead Designer in San Francisco for four years, and gained experience leading projects with clients internationally. At LUNAR, he was also a founding member of the internal sustainability team.
He has also been involved in several Social Design programs, and in 2009 he funded Razón Social, a non-profit design group focused on Social Development Design programs in Mexico. He has taught design in multiple Mexican universities.
He obtained a Bachelor Degree with Honors in Industrial Design from UNAM (Mexico) and a Masters Degree in Transportation Design from Umeå University (Sweden).
An avid runner, Alberto is currently planning his 5th full marathon.