Xavier Serbia
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Xavier Serbia (born July, 24th 1968) is a former member of Menudo. He joined Menudo in 1980 and stayed with Menudo through most of Menudo's glory days.
Among the songs he sang as a member of Menudo were Rock en la TV and Formula. Those two songs were duets with Miguel Cancel.
Xavier was the blond guy in the group, and his popularity among girl fans was probably second only to Rene Farrait's. He participated with Menudo in Una Aventura LLamada Menudo and a soap opera, and, because of his voice and looks, he played an important role in Menudo's success.
Xavier was replaced by Ray Reyes at Menudo in 1983, and later on, went to try a solo career. In 1986, he participated in Puerto Rican television's comedy series La Pension De Dona Tere. In 1987, he joined fellow former Menudos Farrait and Johnny Lozada in a more mature and soft music oriented group named Proyecto M (which was wildly successful in Venezuela). In 1989, he hosted a Spanish version of Remote Control (Control Remoto), for Puerto Rico's WAPA-TV. This job only lasted 3 months, however, because MTV found out that WAPA-TV was using the likeness of Remote Control in Spanish without their proper permission and threatened to take WAPA-TV to court if WAPA didn't cancel the show or pay the licensing fee asked by MTV.
Serbia had left Proyecto M in 1988 and been replaced, once again, by Ray Reyes.
Serbia signed a five year contract with Capitol EMI Latin, a subdivision of the multinational record company Capitol EMI, in 1990. In Puerto Rico, his music occupied among top position in popularity in the tropical category. In the same period, his music was among the top Latin tracks on the Billboard Charts.
After two productions with EMI Capitol, Xavier disappeared from public life. He moved to Costa Rica, where he finished his B.A in International Relations. He was offered to join some of the ex Menudos in 1998 for a comeback tour named El Reencuentro, but he declined, allegedly saying that Menudo was a beautiful part of his past and he wants to keep it that way.
Back in the United States, he worked as a broker and planning associate for a multinational company. He finalized a master degree in business administration (MBA) with concentration in finances. During this period, he appeared as a commentator on such Telemundo Network shows as “Noticiero Nacional Telemundo’, “Esta Mañana” and “América en Vivo”, among others.
In 2003, he was elected by NBC-Telemundo and Ford, to host the business series El Camino Al Triunfo (http://www.telemundo.com/elcaminoaltriunfo/index.html) where he performed as writer, advisor and host. He was subject of articles in Hispanic newspapers such as La Opinión, Reforma, El Nuevo Dia, Sun-Sentinel, Prensa y Hola Hoy, and La Raza among others.
That same year, Xavier launched XavierSerbia.com (http://www.xavierserbia.com), a Spanish language site where he informs the Hispanic community in the US about personal finances and small business. The site offers information divided by "Zones". Each "zones" cover Investments (http://www.xavierserbia.com/zonainversiones/index.htm), Small Business (http://www.xavierserbia.com/zonamibusiness/index.htm), Insurance (http://www.xavierserbia.com/zonaseguro/index.htm), Retirement (http://www.xavierserbia.com/zonaretiro/index.htm),Mortgage (http://www.xavierserbia.com/zonacasa/index.htm),Credit (http://www.xavierserbia.com/zonacredito/index.htm), and others, combined with hundreds of links to other sites related to the section.
At present Xavier is pursuing his second master degree in Financial Economics at Trinity College. He also performs public presentations where he shares his knowledge and experience in the area of personal finances and small business.