The name at birth is Sergio Raúl Melnick Israel. His grandfather, Gregorio Melnick, was born in Bessarabia. Hisfather was Julio Melnick Abeliuk. He began his career as a professor at the Faculty of Economics of the University of Chile, at the age of23. In 1981 he was appointed Director of the Department of Economics of the Faculty,later in1984 he was Dean of the same faculty, and he achieved hte rank of full professor of that university in 1986. He was a consultant for ECLAC, and UNEP (UnitedNations Environment Program), between 1974 and 1976. He was Head of the ODEPLAN Investment Department in the early 1980s, and later Minister of Planning between 1987 and 1989. He worked as executive vice president of Channel 1 of the University of Chile (1983-1985). Later he was one of the founders of the television channel La Red (1991), and its executive director. He was a columnist for Hoy ma- gazine, and also for Unisys's Signal magazine. He has served as general managerand member of the board of directors of several companies: HNS, SQM, Chilectra, Banco Edwards, Chilefilms, Harley Davidson, Toronto Capital and Tramaca, among others. He was a technology commentator on Televisión Nacional de Chile in the 1980s, a panelist for the program Claves y senses (1998) of UCV Television, a panelist for the current program Zero Tolerance (2005-2008) of Chilevisió, and also a panelist for the program Hands-free (2008) by Mega.