Américo Ferreira de Amorim's career is a living example of the power of work and of individual determination, which has inspired multiple generations around the world.
He will be remembered in the history of Portugal as one of the leading figures of the 20th and 21st centuries - as an entrepreneur, wealth creator and driving force of the country's development and modernisation - in industry, real estate, tourism and finance.
The experience accumulated over decades of work in the most varied and adverse circumstances has enabled me to pay testimony to this long experience. This is not a question of talking about past successes, but rather of offering guidance to new generations, since the works have been built with a logic and precision that leaves no room for luck or chance. There have been many economic, social and political cycles over the past decades. I have followed these phenomena and their developments with a strong concern to capture the essential and not get lost in the details.
From an early age, I understood that works are built on the basis of participation and respect for everyone around us. Inequalities drive people away and foment conflict. The human factor has always been a kind of magic wand that underpins the success of companies. In my perspective, the importance of the human factor has never been so strong and demanding as at present. This attention to reality and to all those around us, combined with courage and lucidity, are fundamental elements that support adequate decision-making, without which it is impossible to construct a building.
At each moment in time it is necessary to know what you want, have clear objectives, pursue them with determination, and adapt them with the utmost rigour and effectiveness. Taking decisions requires inner confidence that allows us to build the future. In my opinion, economics is a matter of space and imagination. The world has never been so open to fertile imagination.
The importance of obstacles exclusively depends on the ability of each person to know how to overcome them. In this respect, experience is a good school of life. There will never be technological development and renewal, nor prosperity, without a strong component of irreverence and creativity.
Passion and work are fundamental requirements to enable new generations to build the future. We form part of a new world economic order, that opens up possibilities that were unthinkable 15 or 20 years ago. But this new outlook is much more demanding in terms of the need for capacity, foresight, professionalism, responsibility, rigour, perspicacity and greater attention to social attitudes. In short, we must now almost constantly foresee future developments. To be an entrepreneur for the future is a formidable challenge, that is also wonderful due to the tremendous potential it offers.
Opportunities arise every day and the Amorim Group's history is written every second, with the strength and energy of each of us. The Amorim Group has a long history, that began in 1870, and has always been very noble and very responsible. We will not refrain from pursuing it and consolidating it. For all these reasons, the current moment is a remarkable step in our Group’s history.
It is profoundly rewarding to identify with what we have built together over the years.