Alan Patricof

Patricof serves on the Board of Overseers of Columbia University Graduate School of Business. As of 2011 he serves as an advisor to the Grassroots Business Fund.

Patricof has been active in Democratic Party politics, contributing to candidates including Bill and Hillary Clinton. Patricof was the national finance chairman for Hillary Clinton's 2008 campaign. Patricof is a longtime affiliate of Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of Donald Trump.

By the mid-1990s Apax had become one of the larger private equity firms globally. In 2001, Patricof stepped back from day-to-day management of the firm, to return to his original focus on venture capital investments in small early-stage companies. In 2006, he left Apax to form Greycroft Partners which focuses on such investments.

As an early investor in venture capital he has been involved in the development of numerous major companies including America Online, Office Depot, Cadence Design Systems, Apple Computer and FORE Systems. New York magazine later acquired the Village Voice and New West magazine. Patricof also acquired style magazine Details in 1987. He has also been involved with Cellular Communications, Inc., NTL, and Audible. Patricof recently published a memoir, “No Red Lights,” where he recounts with mild regret how he passed on an opportunity to invest in Starbucks in the 1980s.

Patricof was assigned the management of the Gottesman pulp and paper fortune. and focused his efforts on the new private companies in the portfolio. In 1967, he invested in New York magazine, a new publication, where he served as the founding chairman of the board. The magazine proved a success. In 1969, he was able to raise $2.5 million and founded one of the first venture capital firms, Patricof Company Ventures. In 1977, he founded the private equity firm Apax Partners.

Patricof grew up in a Jewish family on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, New York City, the son of parents who had immigrated from Russia to the United States. His father was a small-time stockbroker. Patricof graduated from the Ohio State University in 1955, and earned an M.B.A. from Columbia University in 1957 while working full-time as an analyst for an investment firm.

Alan Patricof (born 22 October 1934) is an American investor, one of the early pioneers of the venture capital and private equity industries. He founded Apax Partners (based on a play on Patricof's name: Alan Patricof Associates Cross (x) Border), which is one of the world's largest private equity firms.