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Mellody Hobson has been the Co-CEO of Ariel Investments, LLC, an investment management firm, since 2019 and President and Director since 2000. She has also served as Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Ariel Investment Trust, a registered investment company advised by Ariel Investments, since 2006.

Ms. Hobson has been a director of Starbucks Corporation since 2005 and has served as its Vice Chair since 2018. She served as a director of The Estée Lauder Companies Inc. from 2005 to 2018 and as a director of DreamWorks Animation SKG, Inc. from 2004 to 2016.

Ms. Hobson works with a number of civic, non-profit and professional organizations, acting as a Director of the Chicago Public Education Fund; Chair of After School Matters, which provides Chicago teens with high quality out-of-school time programs; a member of the Executive Committee of the Investment Company Institute’s Board of Governors; Board member of the George Lucas Education Foundation; Vice Chair of World Business Chicago, and many other organizations. She is also a former Chair of the Economic Club of Chicago.

Ms. Hobson graduated from the Woodrow Wilson School of International Relations and Public Policy at Princeton University.