Cristina Martinez studied Science Philosophy, Communication (Major) and has an MSc in Telematics (Cum Laude) from the Université Libre de Bruxelles. 

She started her career in the United Nations Office headquarters working for an IT track and trace software project for Africa, Asia and Latin-America. She then joined the Andersen Consulting company in 1998 to work for the eCommerce group of the Technology department as a solutions engineer. 

She became a member of the staff of the European Commission in 2002 first, as communication officer, then as a senior administrator for research in the 'Enterprise Networking' Unit of the Information Society Directorate-General where she lead the 'Enterprise Interoperability' area. 

In 2013, Cristina became Head of Sector and then Deputy Head of Unit for various departements: the 'Knowledge-Management' unit, the 'eInfrastructure and Open Science Cloud' unit and the ‘Smart Mobility and Living’ unit. Since January this year, she is responsible for the Smart Cities topic.