Francisco X. Pineda

Francisco X. Pineda is a faculty member of the Master of Science in Construction Administration at Columbia University. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and a senior executive leading the NYC Economic Development Corporation’s major commercial and industrial real estate portfolio. His research and professional interests lie in organizational intelligence, critical capabilities, and the structuring and management of complex project-based teams and enterprises.

In his twenty-year career, he has worked on all aspects of the development cycle—investment, development, and construction. He has led and turned around property development companies and construction projects, as well as businesses in hospitality, building materials, and more recently in climate-tech focused on waste valorization in Mexico.

His early career included corporate strategy roles at Hess as well as investment banking and private equity at Merrill Lynch. He was also engaged to lead one of the Middle East’s largest corporate recovery initiatives working alongside Shearman & Sterling and Moelis & Co. on restructuring a $1.6 billion real estate portfolio.

Francisco serves as an U.S. Navy (Reserves) officer having served on deployments to Africa and Asia on large-scale wargaming exercises. In 2018 he was selected as a Presidential Leadership Scholar by the Clinton-GW Bush-HW Bush-LBJ Foundations and supports other defense and policy initiatives through his affiliation with the Energy Academic Group at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA. 

More recently, in his programmatic and faculty roles at Columbia University, has co-founded the Columbia Construction Diversity Initiative, a research and development initiative focused on improving the supply chain and access and training of MWBE (Workforce, Veteran, and Disabled) contractors in NYC and the Empire Infrastructure Council with other leading NYS R1 institutions. 

He has served on several boards, industry committees, and as a senior advisor: 

• NYC Mayor Task Force, Assessment and Recommendations of NYC Contracting and Procurement Reform  
• MTA, Member of the Major Construction Review Unit
• Biden Infrastructure Policy Committee 2020
• World Economic Forum, Infrastructure 4.0
• Urban Land Institute’s (ULI-NY) Program Steering Committee 
• Cities4All Global Leaders Council (Ford Foundation, UN-United Cities & Local Government) 

Selected Projects & Deal Experience

• New York MTA (Metropolitan Transportation Authority) +$11 billion East Side Access Ops Readiness Review: Member of the MTA’s Major Construction Review Unit (MCRU)
• New York MTA (Metropolitan Transportation Authority) ~$2 billion Penn Station Access Project: Appointed member of the MTA’s Major Construction Review Unit (MCRU)
• $4 billion Delta/La Guardia Airport Reconfiguration Plan (NYC) Advisor to General Superintendent on Field Training and Development 
• $7 billion Columbia University Manhattanville Development (NYC) Advisor on Sub-contractor Diversity Procurement and Development, MWBE 
• $1.6 billion Restructuring of Sovereign Wealth Fund Real Estate and Construction Portfolio SVP Investment and Development and Executive Restructuring Committee (Infra, Hospitality, F&B, and Luxury Resi Assets)

Courses

Francisco teaches and has taught the Elementals, Megaprojects, Capstone, Advanced Project Management, Development & Construction, and Independent Study courses.