BRANDO CRESPI

Founder of the Mobius Group, Anthropologist and environmentalist, Coordinator of the strategies for Pro-Natura.

Personal History

Brando Crespi, born in Lausanne, Switzerland and raised in Rome, was educated at Le Rosey, Switzerland, Barcote College, Oxford and at Georgetown University. His studies focused on economics and cultural anthropology.

Married and the father of three, he holds an Italian and a Brazilian Passport and speaks five languages. Crespi now lives primarily in Rome after many years spent in France, the US and South America.

Today Crespi divides his time between strategic consulting, environmental work, writing and lecturing.

Professional Experience

Watersdale Consulting: Senior Associate
1998 to present- Paris/Rome/London

Since 1998 Crespi consults to a number of multinational companies in areas ranging from innovation to strategic marketing and business development. A partial list of his recent and present clients includes Procter and Gamble, L’Oreal, Giorgio Armani, Givaudan, ST Microelectronics, Lucent, Beijing’s BMK and Shanghai’s Matsuoka Corp and CFNL.

Habitat: Creative Director 1997 Paris/London

Crespi was responsible for “re-branding” the home furnishing & design company. He supervised 109 stores in 13 countries, merchandise, advertising, catalogues and coordinated product development teams in Paris and London.

Pro-Natura International: Director of Strategy 1990 to present, Rio/ New York/Paris/Rome

As a founder and active Director of Pro-Natura International, a Franco-Brazilian NGO, Crespi has helped start and fund sustainable development projects in 27 countries.

In June 1998 Crespi was responsible for the Pro Natura/ Givaudan “Scent Trek” expedition which used a dirigible to search for new scents in the canopy of Guyana’s Amazon rain forest. This project, which was the subject of extensive TV and press coverage, won the Fragrance Foundation’s “1999 Award for Innovation”. Subsequent expeditions have since taken place in the year 2000 in Gabon and in 2002 in Madagascar.

His interest in ethno-botany and has led to the creation of Biodivalor, a Pro Natura ethical bio-prospecting project that has been supported by Dragoco, Dior, Quest, Roche, Aventis, Novartis and Glaxo, amongst others.

In 1997 Pro-Natura was awarded by US’s Academy of Sciences the Mitchell Prize for its work in Sustainable Development.

Amongst its many projects today, Pro Natura is creating a 12.000-hectare, ten million tree, “carbon sink” reforestation project in the Brazilian Amazon to make Peugeot cars “CO2 emission neutral”.

Brando Crespi and Associates: President 1978-1991- Los Angeles / New York BC&A, started as a full service communication and marketing company with offices in New York and Los Angeles, has counted amongst its clients fashion and design companies as Krizia, Salvatore Ferragamo, Ermenegildo Zegna, Marina Spadafora, Christofle, Idea Como, and Pratesi. It also opened the Los Angeles franchises for Fendi and Versace and launched (in association with Revlon) the Fendi and Laura Biagiotti perfumes.

In 1979 BC&A did the initial launch of Rodeo Drive, and years later of the Los Angeles Hard Rock Café.
In the early eighties it started focusing and often investing in consumer goods and high technology start-ups such as Earthrise Spirulina, The Samadhi Company, The Ion Foundation, Molecular Electronics, ReSeal Packaging Technologies, Acquachlor, Seeds of Change and Thigh Master.
BC&A also sponsored and organized the “Beyond Profit-Social Responsibility and other challenges for multinationals” conference that took place at the UN in May 1990.

Mobius Group: Founder, Director 1977- 1984 Los Angeles
Crespi founded the Mobius Group in Los Angeles with Stephan Schwartz, a strategic analyst who had been an assistant to Admiral Zumwalt, the US Navy’s chief of Naval Operations.
Mobius was designed to be an applied parapsychology lab, devoted to explore practical applications of remote sensing in areas of archaeology, criminology and strategic research.
It’s best known achievement was probably the location of the Timonium (Marc Anthony’s Palace) and of the Temple of Isis in Alexandria, Egypt. This was the subject of a best selling book “The Alexandria Project” by Stephan Schwartz which has been translated in many languages

Anthropological Fieldwork
1973 to 1977- Brazil / Colombia / Peru
Privately funded research on Amazonian Shamanism, Brazilian animism and ethno botany.

Momento Sera: Foreign News Writer
1972-1973 Italy
Crespi started as a reporter and eventually covered International Affairs for Rome’s afternoon paper.

Suoi articoli in questo sito:
– Il caso Pro Natura (L’Espresso 11/3/1999)
– Eau de Rain Forest (NY Times magazine 5/99)
– Antonio e Cleopatra abitavano qua?