All you need to know about Mellody Hobson

Publish date: 2024-05-19

Mellody Hobson is an American businesswoman with a net worth of $100 million. Mellody Hobson gained global attention in 2013 when she married millionaire filmmaker George Lucas. Mellody is the president and co-CEO of Chicago-based Ariel Investments, and she formerly served as DreamWorks Animation’s chairwoman.

Hobson was appointed vice-chair of the Starbucks Corporation board of directors in 2018 and promoted to non-executive chair in 2021, making her the first Black woman to chair an S&P 500 (Standard and Poor’s 500) corporation.

Who is Mellody Hobson?

Mellody Hobson was born on April 3, 1969, in Chicago, Illinois. Mellody has five older siblings and attended St. Ignatius College Preparatory. After graduat ing in 1987, Hobson attended Princeton University, where she joined the Cottage Club, one of several eating clubs on campus. She graduated from Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs in 1991, and in 2019, the school honored her with the Woodrow Wilson Award during Alumni Day. In 2020, Mellody and the Hobson/Lucas Family Foundation gave cash to Princeton to “establish a new residential college at Princeton University.”

The residential college will be named Hobson College and will be built on the location of what was previously known as Wilson College. In June 2020, Princeton’s Board of Trustees agreed to remove Woodrow Wilson’s name from campus buildings owing to his “racist views and policies.” Mellody described her time at Princeton as follows: “No one in my family had graduated from college when I arrived from Chicago, but even as I looked up at buildings named after Rockefeller and Forbes, I felt at home.” I hope that my name will serve as a reminder to future generations of kids, particularly those who are Black and brown and the ‘firsts’ in their families, that they, too, belong.

In 2017, she became the first African-American woman to serve as chair of The Economic Club of Chicago. Hobson has been a financial contributor on “Good Morning America” and “CBS This Morning,” as well as the host and executive producer of the 2009 ABC special “Un-Broke: What You Need to Know About Money.” Mellody has been named to “Ebony” magazine’s “20 Leaders of the Future” list (1992), “Esquire” magazine’s “America’s Best and Brightest” list (2002), the “Wall Street Journal’s” “50 Women to Watch” list (2004), and “Time” magazine’s list of “The World’s 100 Most Influential People” (2015).

How old is Mellody Hobson?

What is Mellody Hobson nationality and ethnicity?

She holds American nationality and belongs to a black ethnic descent.

She is currently 54 years old.

What is Mellody Hobson’s net worth?

She is estimated to be worth $100 Million.

What is Mellody Hobson’s career?

Hobson began working as an intern with Ariel Investments after graduating from Princeton. She subsequently rose to the position of Senior Vice President and Director of Marketing before being named President in 2000. By January 2021, the company managed $15 billion in assets, making it one of the largest African-American-owned mutual fund and money management companies in the United States.

Mellody also leads the Ariel Investment Trust board of trustees, and she has served on the boards of several institutions, including the Sundance Institute, JPMorgan Chase & Co., and the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art. She previously served on the board of directors of The Estée Lauder Companies Inc., and before becoming chair of the Starbucks Corporation’s board, she was the head of the company’s finance committee.

Mellody hosted the 2009 ABC program “Unbroke: What You Need to Know About Money,” which included Samuel L. Jackson, Seth Green, Rosario Dawson, Will Smith, the Jonas Brothers, and other celebrities, and she guest-hosted the “CBS Sunday Morning” “Money Issue” episode in 2017. Vanessa L. Williams based her character, Courtney Paige, from the CBS drama “The Good Wife,” on Hobson and has stated that she watched Mellody’s TED Talks in preparation for the part. Hobson became DreamWorks Animation’s chairperson in 2012, and she negotiated the studio’s $3.8 billion acquisition by NBCUniversal in 2016 before stepping down.