Maria Morales-Prieto is the president and CEO of The Hispanic Network (THN), a business development firm dedicated to bridging the burgeoning Hispanic market and the world.

Before founding THN, Maria served as the executive director of the Long Island Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. During her tenure, she doubled the chamber's membership roster and grew the attendance at its monthly meetings by six times. Maria also launched the chamber's business incubator called the Smart Business Exchange.

Maria is best known, though, for her work at Latin Long Island magazine where she served as managing editor, writing, editing, designing and supervising the cadre of writers while planning the publication's galas twice a year. Under Maria's direction, the magazine doubled its subscription base and tripled its circulation.

Maria co-produced a documentary for PBS entitled "The Cuban Americans," founded and served as editor of her own publication, El Informal, which was dedicated to Cuban exiles around the globe, and was commissioned to create a sitcom and write a pilot for a producer with the Fox network.

Maria has written columns for various publications including Long Island Business News, Catalina magazine and Divina.com, and was featured in the NY Times best selling book about successful Latinas, "La Vida Rica" by Yrma Rico.

Interestingly, Maria is also the great grand daughter of Cuba's second president, Jose Miguel Gomez and the grand niece of another Cuban president, Miguel Mariano Gomez.