After putting in 35 years leading sales efforts at Lawrence Behr & Associates’ (LBA Group) Latin America market, Javier Castillo has announced his retirement. As LBA’s long time Latin America Broadcast Sales Manager, LBA honored Castillo as being “instrumental in establishing LBA’s market dominance in Mexico and beyond.”
Castillo’s long and interesting journey to LBA began from his home country of Nicaragua to New Orleans, ultimately obtaining his MBA from Tulane University in 1977. He returned to Nicaragua and two years later the Sandinistas took over the government and Castillo fled the country. He began working internationally for Wrangler Spain, a subsidiary of Blue Bell, Inc. His journey eventually took him to Greenville, NC and not long after arriving in Greenville, the headquarters for LBA, Castillo met company Founder and CEO Lawrence Behr. The two connected right away as Behr had roots in Latin America with family in Mexico, Peru, and Venezuela. In 1985, Behr decided to bring Castillo on board to lead broadcast sales and marketing efforts to Latin America.
“Broadcasting in 1985 was pretty basic compared to the U.S. and modern telecommunications that was emerging here, like cellular, had not emerged in Latin America, so we were moving into a whole new market,” said Behr. It proved successful as LBA became well established very quickly.
“The decades-long personal relationships forged by Javier and his unique understanding of the market made LBA a natural partner for many broadcast and telecommunication interests across South America,” added Behr.
Castillo and LBA is more than just a product supplier to its Latin America customers. To recognize the talent, dedication, and loyalty of the great engineers he served, Castillo was instrumental in creating the Engineer of the Year Award. Since 2003, the award has been presented each year to a member of the Mexican Association of Broadcast Engineers and Technicians. The award is presented on behalf of LBA and comes with a monetary prize and certificate.
“It’s an honor to have spent all these years building so many great relationships and being part of some really unique projects where our products and solutions ultimately made great impacts,” said Castillo.
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