Laurene Powell Jobs | |
|---|---|
 Powell Jobs in 2012 | |
| Born | Laurene Powell (1963-11-06)November 6, 1963 (age 61) West Milford, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Education | University of Pennsylvania (BA,BS) Stanford University (MBA) |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 3, includingReed andEve |
| Relatives | Mona Simpson (sister-in-law) |
Laurene Powell Jobs (néePowell; born November 6, 1963)[1][2] is an American billionaire businesswoman executive and philanthropist.[3] She is the widow ofSteve Jobs, who was the co-founder and former CEO ofApple Inc., and she manages the Steve Jobs Trust.[4][5] She is the founder and chairman ofEmerson Collective[3] andXQ Institute.[6] She is a major donor toDemocratic Party politicians.[7][8][9]
Powell Jobs was raised inWest Milford, New Jersey.[10] She earned aB.A. in political science from theUniversity of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences and aB.S. degree in economics from theWharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in 1985.[3][11][12] She received herMBA degree from theStanford Graduate School of Business in 1991.[3][12][13]
Powell Jobs co-founded Terravera, anatural foods company that sold to retailers throughoutNorthern California.[3][14] She also served on theboard of directors of Achieva, which created online tools to help students prepare forstandardized testing.[14] Before business school, Powell Jobs worked forMerrill Lynch Asset Management and spent three years atGoldman Sachs as a fixed-income trading strategist.[3][14]
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On October 5, 2011, at the age of 56,Steve Jobs, the CEO of Apple, died due to complications from a relapse of islet cell neuroendocrinepancreatic cancer.[15][16] Powell Jobs inherited the Steven P. Jobs Trust, which as of May 2013 had a 7.3% stake inThe Walt Disney Company worth about $12.1 billion, and 38.5 million shares of Apple Inc.[5][10][12]
As of July 2020[update], Powell Jobs and her family were ranked 59th in theForbes' annual list of the world's billionaires[17][18] and 30th in the Forbes 400.[19] According to the same list, she is the wealthiest woman in the technology industry.
In 1997, Powell Jobs co-founded College Track together withCarlos Watson.[20][21]
In 2004, Powell Jobs founded theEmerson Collective, a privatelimited liability company[22] that supports social entrepreneurs and organizations working in education and immigration reform, social justice, media, journalism, and conservation through partnerships, grants, and investments.[3][23] Through Emerson, Powell Jobs ownsThe Atlantic and a stake inAxios.[24][25]
In 2013, Powell Jobs was an early investor in[26] and board member ofOzy Media.[27] Ozy also credited her as a "contributor."[28]
In the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Powell Jobs donated $2 million toHillary Clinton and raised another $4 million for her campaign.[29][30]
In 2017, Powell Jobs purchased a 20 percent stake inMonumental Sports & Entertainment, which owns the NBA'sWashington Wizards, NHL'sWashington Capitals, andCapital One Arena. She was the second-largest shareholder behind chairmanTed Leonsis.[31][32]
Also in 2017, she backed the founding of the political organizationACRONYM,[33] which raised ethical questions for Powell Jobs for its creation ofCourier Newsroom.[34]
In 2018, she stated that the bookSmall Fry by her stepdaughterLisa Brennan contains false information about Steve Jobs as a father.[35]
As of 2023, she is an investor inCalifornia Forever, a company building a planned sustainable city inSolano County, California.[36]
In 2025, she visited India forMaha Kumbh Mela 2025.[37][38] During her visit, she adopted the Hindu name “Kamala” and participated in the traditionalKalpavas ritual, which includes daily baths in sacred rivers, meditation, and a strict vegetarian diet.[39]
In 1997, Powell Jobs andCarlos Watson co-founded College Track, a nonprofit organization inEast Palo Alto to improve high school graduation, college enrollment, and college graduation rates for "underserved" students.[40][41][42][43]
Of College Track's high school graduates, many of whom are first-generation college students, about 90 percent attend four-year colleges, and 70 percent finish college in six years, whereas the national average for first-generation college students is 24 percent.[42] College Track has facilities inEast Palo Alto,Sacramento,San Francisco,Oakland,Watts,Boyle Heights,New Orleans,Aurora, Colorado,Denver, and theWashington, D.C., area.[41][42][44][45] "We have a wait list of five cities where we'd like to open up centers," Powell Jobs has said. "We want to keep our standards high, though, and are reluctant to grow through franchising or through dissemination of our curriculum and training."[42]
In September 2015, Powell Jobs launched a $50 million project to create high schools with new approaches to education. CalledXQ: The Super School Project, the initiative aims to inspire teams of educators, students, and community leaders to create and implement new plans for high schools. Efforts include altering school schedules, curriculums and technologies in order to replace the country's century-old high school education model. Funding for XQ comes from Powell Jobs' Emerson Collective. Following an initial $50 million financial contribution,[46][47] XQ announced an additional contribution, awarding ten schools $10 million each, for a total financial contribution of $100 million.[48][49][50] The schools were chosen from approximately 700 submissions nationwide.[51][52] Powell Jobs's team of advisors is led by Russlynn H. Ali.[46][47]
Powell Jobs is a founding member of theClimate Leadership Council.[53][verification needed] As of 2018, Powell Jobs sits on the board of directors of College Track, Conservation International, and Stanford University.[3][12][54] She is chair of the board of directors of XQ[55] and also sits on the chairman's advisory board of theCouncil on Foreign Relations.[3][54] In 2023, she was ranked as the 25thmost powerful woman in the world byForbes.[56]
Powell Jobs's philanthropy has been described as of limited "transparency and accountability."[57] In 2019, Powell Jobs was designated the "Least Transparent Mega-Giver" byInside Philanthropy.[58][59][60]
In October 1989, Steve Jobs gave a "View from the Top" lecture atStanford Business School. Laurene Powell was a new MBA student and started up a conversation with Jobs, who was seated next to her. They subsequently had dinner together that night.[61] A year and a half later, on March 18, 1991, they married in a traditionalBuddhist wedding ceremony at theAhwahnee Hotel inYosemite National Park.[62][63] Presiding over the wedding wasKōbun Chino Otogawa, aZenBuddhist monk.[62][64]
Powell Jobs resides inPalo Alto, California.[14] In 2024, she purchased the most expensive residential property in San Francisco worth $70 million.[65] She and Steve Jobs had three children together: sonReed (born September 1991) and daughters Erin (born 1995) andEve (born 1998). Laurene is also the stepmother ofLisa Brennan-Jobs (born 1978), Steve's daughter from a previous relationship.
Gross National Happiness Medal (Kingdom of Bhutan, 16/01/2025).[66]Lauren Powell had been born in New Jersey in 1963 and learned to be self-sufficient at an early age.
Laurene Powell Jobs, CW'85
Powell Jobs has been close with Ozy C.E.O. Carlos Watson for decades—the two co-founded College Track, her first philanthropic initiative, back in East Palo Alto in 1997
College Track, a program he co-founded to aid students in East Palo Alto
The Emerson Collective is a Limited Liability Company (LLC)
As an LLC, Emerson also invests in for-profit companies, meaning that it may be hard for Emerson to ever wind down completely and entirely. (After all, if she died tomorrow, Emerson might still own a majority stake in the Atlantic.)
Emerson has invested in media start-ups such as Axios
Laurene Powell, the widow of former Apple Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs, backed the startup
Laurene Powell Jobs, who had co-founded a college prep nonprofit with Mr. Watson in 1997, invested and joined the Ozy board
As an investor, contributor and member of OZY's Board of Directors, Laurene Powell Jobs[dead link]
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)In 2016, she backed Hillary Clinton, donating $2 million to her super PAC via her nonprofit and hosting a $200,000-a-plate fundraiser that raised more than $4 million
Another initiative went more smoothly, at least at first. It was called Acronym; among its backers were the Dollar Shave Club founder Michael Dubin, Mr. Hoffman and Ms. Powell Jobs.
Acronym – a sprawling digital organization whose programs include millions of dollars in traditional political advertising and voter engagement efforts, with financing from some of the deepest pockets in progressive politics, such as liberal billionaires Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn, and Laurene Powell Jobs, the majority owner of The Atlantic – has stirred outrage and provoked debate about the ethics of such political tactics
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