The American Dream -- Motion Control Style

Colombian-Born Alvaro Villa Brings Imagination to Life

"This business is like working on your favorite hobby all the time."

-- Alvaro Villa, president, AVG, Inc.

Alvaro Villa is a classic American success story. A natural-born engineer with big dreams, he is now tops in his field of audio-animatronics. One of eight children, he tinkered with every electrically-operated gadget he could find, and dreamed of a world of fantasy far away, in a country he had never seen. Mr. Villa came to the United States in 1961 with less than $100, got a job as a dishwasher, and talked his way into an engineering technical school. Within months, he obtained a job as an electronics lab technician at Gulton Industries, an aerospace firm, where he worked on the Surveyor and Apollo space projects, while continuing to attend night school.

In 1969, Villa realized his childhood dream when he joined Disney's Imagineering Division, where he went on to become head of its animation electronics research and development group. He helped design and install the audio-animatronics figures for many of the leading attractions in Orlando's Magic Kingdom theme park, including the Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean, the Tiki Room, It's a Small World and the Hall of Presidents. Like Walt Disney himself, Alvaro Villa was not only a dreamer, but also an entrepreneur. In 1978, Villa left Disney to found AVG, Inc., Chatsworth, CA, to build animated figures for theme parks and other clients throughout the world. The list includes Universal Studios in Hollywood and Florida, Kings Island Theme Park in Ohio, Busch Gardens in Virginia, Space Center Houston, and many others. AVG's expertise includes designing and sculpting three-dimensional figures, creating molds for the characters' flexible silicone-based skins, all mechanical design and construction, show control, figure finishing, costuming, and supervision of installation and field services.

In 1999, Villa was named "Minority Business Exporter of the Year" by the Minority Business Development Agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce. "In Latin societies," notes Villa, "people are separated into social strata. You live and mingle with people of your same birth status. In the United States, there is no such division. People are recognized for what they have become. Here, the sky is the limit."

--FR

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