Thomas J. Pritzker

Tom Pritzker was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. He holds a BA from Claremont Men’s College and MBA and JD degrees from the University of Chicago. Pritzker is executive chairman of Hyatt Hotels and the Pritzker Organization, which is the family’s historical merchant bank. Over his career, he has been involved in acquiring and building companies in a number of different industries and founding significant start-ups in the fields of container leasing (Triton), biotechnology (Bay City Capital), and healthcare (Reliant Pharmaceuticals and First Health). Outside of business, Pritzker is chairman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, D.C., and a member of the Aspen Strategy Group. He is a member of the executive committee of the board of the University of Chicago. Pritzker is also chairman of the board of the Hyatt Foundation, which sponsors the Pritzker Architecture Prize. In the sciences, he partnered with the president of the University of Chicago to create a school of molecular engineering and organized the Pritzker Neuropsychiatric Disorders Research Consortium, a collaborative research effort into the genetic basis of psychiatric disorders. He is also an honorary professor of history at Sichuan University in China, has an honorary doctorate from Tsinghua University, and for the past 30 years has been leading archeological expeditions in the Western Himalayas. Pritzker is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.