John W. Stanton is an American businessman. He is the chairman of the board of Trilogy International Partners, as well as the majority owner of the

Seattle Mariners The Seattle Mariners are an American professional baseball team based in Seattle. They compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) West division. The team joined the American League as an expansion team ...

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

(MLB).
company website; accessed April 27, 2016.

Early life and education

Stanton was born in 1955. A lifelong resident of the Seattle area, John Stanton went to Newport High School (Bellevue, Washington), Newport High School in

Bellevue, Washington Bellevue ( ) is a city in the Eastside region of King County, Washington, United States, located across Lake Washington from Seattle. It is the third-largest city in the Seattle metropolitan area and has variously been characterized as ...

. He earned his undergraduate degree in

Whitman College Whitman College is a private liberal arts college in Walla Walla, Washington. The school offers 53 majors and 33 minors in the liberal arts and sciences, and it has a student-to-faculty ratio of 9:1. Whitman was the first college in the Pacific ...

Walla Walla, Washington Walla Walla is a city in Walla Walla County, Washington, where it is the largest city and county seat. It had a population of 34,060 at the 2020 census, estimated to have decreased to 33,927 as of 2021. The population of the city and its two su ...

. He earned an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Career

Founding wireless companies

Stanton was the founder and former CEO of

Western Wireless Corporation Western Wireless Corporation was a cellular network operator that provided mobile telecommunications service to subscribers in 19 western states and seven countries. Western Wireless marketed analog cellular service under the CELLULAR ONE brand ...

, former chairman and CEO of VoiceStream Wireless, and former chairman of the CTIA. He became the first employee of McCaw Cellular Communications in the early 1980s. He was COO and vice chairman of McCaw Cellular in the 1980s. After he left McCaw he founded the company that became Western Wireless Corp in 1992. From 1992 to 2005, he was at Western Wireless Corp. as CEO and chairman. He was the founder of Voicestream Wireless Corp. Between 1995 and 2003, VoiceStream Wireless had him as chairman and CEO as well, with that company renamed T-Mobile USA after an acquisition. From 2008 until 2013 he was director and then chairman of Clearwire Corp.

Trilogy International

In 2005, he, Strive Masiyiwa, Bradley Horwitz, and others formed Trilogy International Partners. At the start, Stanton had a $295 million equity stake in Trilogy. In 2006, his net worth was $1 billion. Stanton was listed as #840 in the'' Forbes'' 2007 "Richest People" study. His net worth was estimated at US$1.1 billion. By 2014, he had held executive roles at

McCaw Cellular McCaw Cellular Communications was a cellular telephone pioneer in the United States. Savvy licensing of cellular spectrum in the early 1980s put McCaw Cellular in an extremely strong position, quickly outpacing the growth of the "Baby Bells" in t ...

, Western Wireless and VoiceStream Wireless. He had also previously been chairman of Clearwire. Stanton joined

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washin ...

's board of directors in July 2014.Profile
bloomberg.com; accessed September 22, 2014.Profile
accessed September 22, 2014. He joined the Compensation Committee of the board. He was also a director at Columbia Sportswear. Around 2016, he joined the board of

Costco Costco Wholesale Corporation (Trade name, doing business as Costco Wholesale and also known simply as Costco) is an American multinational corporation which operates a chain of membership-only Big-box store, big-box retail stores (warehouse c ...

. As of August 2016, Stanton was reported to own approximately US$45 million of stock holdings in

Columbia Sportswear The Columbia Sportswear Company is an American company that manufactures and distributes outerwear, sportswear, and footwear, as well as headgear, camping equipment, ski apparel, and outerwear accessories. It was founded in 1938 by Paul Lam ...

, General Communication Inc. and other companies. He is a past chairman of the board of trustees of

. In 2018, Whitman College elected to name a newly constructed residence hall after Stanton, who had graduated in 1977. He is still a member of Trilogy International Partners with Theresa Gillespie and Brad Horwitz. It trades on the

Toronto Stock Exchange The Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX; french: Bourse de Toronto) is a stock exchange located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is the 10th largest exchange in the world and the third largest in North America based on market capitalization. Based in the ...

. He is also chairman of Trilogy Equity and co-founder of Trilogy Search Partners.

Seattle Mariners

As of one 17 minority owners in the team, in April 2016, Stanton was appointed as the new CEO of the

organization.

formally approved the sale of the Mariners to Stanton in August of that year. Stanton took over as control person from retiring chairman Howard Lincoln. Stanton became responsible for the Seattle Mariners day to day operations. In 2019, the team had few wins, with Stanton arguing the success metric to look at was player success at that time.

Boards

In 2014, he had chaired or co-chaired the Business Partnership for Early Learning, the United Way of King County campaign, the Washington Roundtable, and the Regional Transportation Commission.

Personal life

He resides in

with his wife Theresa Gillespie. They have two sons.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Stanton, John W. Businesspeople from Seattle American billionaires Whitman College alumni Living people Seattle Mariners owners Harvard Business School alumni American technology chief executives Year of birth missing (living people)