Sandra Altamero-Downing

Director

INDUSTRY EXPERIENCE

Sandra is an internationally experienced business strategy professional with six years of experience as a Director of Definity Group. She possesses a broad, global perspective and well-honed interpersonal skills due to multiple graduate degrees in Middle Eastern History, finance and marketing combined with global work experience.

Sandra’s key skills are:

• International property development: hotels, casinos and various mixed use

• Extensive experience with feasibility studies in which financial, marketing, operating and strategic issues are incorporated

• Strategic Planning

• Capital Planning, Monitoring and Auditing

• Excellent oral and written communication skills

• High level of negotiation skills

Sandra’s professional experience includes the following:

• Leader of team formed to respond to a Request for Proposals from the Philippine Government to purchase the majority shareholding of the Manila Hotel, the country's grande dame of hotel properties. While coordinating the marketing, operations, technology, legal and engineering groups, conducted the financial feasibility analysis of this response, which was ultimately shortlisted. The company eventually won the bid, which, due to national politics, was thrown out by the Supreme Court.

• During the casino boom in the US, identified and secured an historical and significant tourist site for further development to include a riverboat casino. This was of importance at the time as many casino companies were vying for the most promising locations and this was undoubtedly one of the most commercially viable.

• Presented proposal to Pricing Committee to price products on the basis of market analysis and the company's strategic positioning, rather than on the allocation of capital expenditures as was originally requested. While the proposal was deliberately non-responsive, it adhered to fundamental business, financial and pricing principles. The rejection of this proposal resulted in the continuation of poorly assessed pricing decisions and capital expenditures allocated in a misleading manner.

• Wrote company policy and procedures for capital planning, monitoring and auditing, such that all stakeholders, from the salespeople to the engineers, were familiar with the importance of making sound capital investments. This was particularly important as the company’s products and cashflows relied on the most commercially sound placement of its hard assets.

• An internal consultant assigned to boutique hotel and spa projects. Responsible for creating financial models for the company to evaluate new boutique hotel and spa opportunities in Australia and Asia.

• As an internal consultant assigned to specific projects, was responsible for creating a financial model for the company to incorporate the shareholder value approach as its method of project management and prioritization. Other projects included preparing institutional offering memoranda and strategic planning.

Sandra’s educational background is as follows:

THE WHARTON SCHOOL, University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

MBA, Dual Major in Marketing and Finance

UNIVERSITY OF LONDON, School of Oriental and African Studies London England

MA in Area Studies - Near and Middle East

THE AMERICAN UNIVERSITY IN CAIRO, Arabic Language Unit Cairo Egypt

Certificate awarded in Intensive Arabic

THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO Chicago, Illinois

BA in Political Science

Concentration in International Relations