Managing Director of Ecotone Investment Fund | Director since 2011
Emma Carmela Wollschlager is the Managing Director of Ecotone Investment Fund, an early-stage venture capital fund in El Paso, Texas to provide capital to promising start-ups from around the globe while providing them with value from El Paso. She also serves as a co-founder and Chief Growth Officer for Samaritan Trade Technologies, a tech marketplace making the manufacturing buyer and seller market along the US-Mexico border and throughout Mexico more efficient. In addition, she co-owns and operates several vacation properties in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.
Prior to these new ventures, Emma founded and served as the President of the Medical Center of the Americas (MCA) Foundation, a non-profit operating in El Paso, Texas and Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, from 2006 to 2022. The MCA developed the first biomedical incubator in the region – the Cardwell Collaborative (60,000 sf) – and the first free-standing mental health clinic for veterans (33,000 sf). The MCA also works to harness a robust Life Sciences industry for the region through its Innovation Center, supporting technology start-up companies; BIO El Paso-Juarez, a bi-national biomedical cluster group representing the medical device manufacturing industry; the MCA Clinical Trials Consortium; the MCA Health Care Think Tank; and STEM camps. Emma was highly involved in the El Paso and Juarez COVID-19 response through the MCA and as a member of the City / County United COVID-19 Task Force.
Before the MCA, Emma worked in healthcare management, revenue cycle improvement, strategic planning and regulatory compliance for a variety of healthcare companies, including Tenet Healthcare in El Paso, Texas and Sinaiko Healthcare Consulting in Los Angeles, California. During this time, she gained extensive experience in the areas of acute care hospitals, physician practices, clinical laboratories, imaging facilities, dialysis centers, and organ transplant.
Emma’s community involvement is extensive. She is a founding director of Progress321, a young professional’s organization, and on the boards of Borderplex Alliance, Workforce Solutions Borderplex, and the Centro Cultural Mexicano Paso del Norte. She is also the co-chair of El Paso’s chapter of Stanford OVAL. Formerly, she served on the board of and former chair of the PDN Center of Hope anti-human trafficking organization, the selection committee for the TTUHSC El Paso Founding President, the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas’ Emerging Leaders Council, the board of La Fe Preparatory School. She is also a member of the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, El Paso Chamber, Texas Healthcare and Biosciences Institute, InBIA and Women Corporate Directors.
In 2016, Emma was inducted into the El Paso Business Hall of Fame, and she was named 2017’s El Pasoan of the Year. In October 2019, the office of Governor Greg Abbott appointed Emma to the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) for a term set to expire on August 31, 2025.
Emma is a proud El Pasoan, who attended Loretto Academy. She received her BA in Human Biology concentrating in Comparative Health Policy from Stanford University and her MPH in Health Services Management from UCLA, where she was a Foley & Lardner Fellow. Ms. Wollschlager has been a director of WestStar Bank since 2011.