Jonathan Gray
New York, New York
Bachelor of Arts/Science, University of Pennsylvania Wharton School
United States
6
investments, Self Made
$3,500,000,000
804
3
#804 Billionaires 2019
#280 Forbes 400 2018
Jonathan Gray started at asset manager Blackstone Group fresh out of college in 1992 and later rose to head the firm's vaunted real estate group.Under Gray, Blackstone's real estate investments became one of its most valuable portfolios, with $120 billion in assets.He orchestrated the $26 billion buyout of Hilton hotels in 2007 then took it public again in 2013; the IPO was then the biggest ever for a hotel firm.In February 2018, Gray was named the firm's COO and president; he's considered a potential successor to cofounder and CEO Steve Schwarzman. Gray has given $55 million to alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, for cancer research.
Gray's family owned a small auto parts manufacturer in Chicago named Blackstone Manufacturing -- no relation to Blackstone Group -- and sold it in the 1970s.Gray met his wife, Mindy, at a romantic poetry class at UPenn and once worked a stint as a guard at a graduate student dorm.
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