William A. Ackman is founder, CEO and portfolio managerof Pershing Square Capital Management, an investment advisory firm, or hedge fund, that he founded in 2003 and typically focuses on large-cap and mid-cap companies.
Most recently, Ackman waged to get a new CEO at Canadian Pacific.
Prior to forming Pershing, Ackman co-founded Gotham Partners Management Co., an investment adviser that managed public and private equity hedge-fund portfolios. Ackman began his career in real estate investment banking at Ackman Brothers & Singer.
Ackman’s board memberships include chairman of The Howard Hughes Corporation, J.C. Penney and Justice Holdings Limited. He is also on the board of dean’s advisers of the Harvard Business School and a number of not-for-profit boards, including the Pershing Square Foundation, a charity he founded in 2007.
He received an MBA from the Harvard Business School and a B.A. magna cum laude from Harvard College.