José E. Feliciano is a Puerto Rican-born American businessman and investor. He is the co-founder and managing partner of investment firm

Clearlake Capital Clearlake Capital Group, L.P. is a private equity firm founded in 2006 that focuses on the technology, industrial and consumer sectors. The firm is headquartered in Santa Monica with affiliates in Dallas, London and Dublin. In 2022, the firm was ...

. According to Forbes, Feliciano has a net worth of $3.8 billion as of January 2024. Feliciano was first placed on Forbes’ Forbes 400 and Forbes Billionaires lists in 2020.

Early life and education

Feliciano was born in

Bayamón, Puerto Rico Bayamón (, ) is a Bayamón barrio-pueblo, city and Municipalities of Puerto Rico, municipality in Puerto Rico. Located on the northeastern coastal plain, it is bounded by Guaynabo, Puerto Rico, Guaynabo to the east, Toa Alta, Puerto Rico, Toa A ...

. He graduated from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

with a degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering in 1994, and received his MBA from the

Stanford Graduate School of Business The Stanford Graduate School of Business is the Postgraduate education, graduate business school of Stanford University, a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California. For several years it has been the most selective ...

Career

Feliciano started his career in investment banking in the

mergers and acquisitions Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are business transactions in which the ownership of a company, business organization, or one of their operating units is transferred to or consolidated with another entity. They may happen through direct absorpt ...

and

corporate finance Corporate finance is an area of finance that deals with the sources of funding, and the capital structure of businesses, the actions that managers take to increase the Value investing, value of the firm to the shareholders, and the tools and analy ...

groups at

Goldman Sachs The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered in Lower Manhattan in New York City, with regional headquarters in many internationa ...

. He served as chief financial officer at govWorks and worked in a senior position at Tennenbaum Capital, an alternative investment management firm. In 2006, Feliciano and

Behdad Eghbali Behdad Eghbali (; born May 6, 1976) is an Iranian–American billionaire businessman and a co-founder and managing partner of the investment firm Clearlake Capital. According to Forbes, Eghbali had a net worth of US$4.4 billion as of June 2025. ...

co-founded Clearlake Capital. In May 2022, a consortium of investors co-led by Clearlake closed its acquisition of

Chelsea Football Club Chelsea Football Club is a professional football club based in Fulham, West London, England. The club was founded in 1905 and named after neighbouring area Chelsea. They compete in the Premier League, the top tier of English football, pl ...

for over £4.25 billion. Feliciano serves on the boards of several Clearlake portfolio companies, including

and WellPet. In 2022 and 2023, the ''Los Angeles Business Journal'' named Feliciano one of the wealthiest Angelenos in Los Angeles.

Personal life

Feliciano is married to Kwanza Jones, an artist and Princeton alumna, and the couple co-founded Kwanza Jones & José E. Feliciano Supercharged Initiative, a philanthropic grant-making organization. In 2017, Clearlake Capital and the Kwanza Jones & José E. Feliciano Supercharged Initiative committed to match donations up to $500,000 for Puerto Rico disaster relief following

Hurricane Maria Hurricane Maria was an extremely powerful and devastating tropical cyclone that affected the northeastern Caribbean in September 2017, particularly in the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico, which accounted for 2,975 of the 3,059 deaths. It is the ...

. Notable contributions have included a $1 million gift to Bennet College in 2019 and a $20 million gift to Princeton in 2020 for student housing. In July 2021, Feliciano was named one of four winners of the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award. In May 2023, Princeton unveiled two residence halls named after Feliciano and his wife, the first buildings in Princeton’s history named after Black and Latino donors. Feliciano serves on the board of directors of

Cedars-Sinai Medical Center Cedars-Sinai Medical Center is a non-profit, Tertiary referral hospital, tertiary, 915-bed teaching hospital and multi-specialty academic health science centre, academic health science center located in Los Angeles, California. Part of the Cedars ...

, the Robert Toigo Foundation and Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights. He is also a trustee of the

J. Paul Getty Trust The J. Paul Getty Trust is the world's wealthiest art institution, with an estimated endowment of US$7.7 billion in 2020. Based in Los Angeles, California, it operates the J. Paul Getty Museum, which has two locations—the Getty Center in the ...

, Stanford University and the Smithsonian’s

National Museum of the American Latino The National Museum of the American Latino is a future Smithsonian Institution museum dedicated to highlighting the contributions of American Latinos in U.S. history and culture.Abbady, Tal. "A Museum of Their Own." ''Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Feliciano, José E. Princeton University alumni Stanford Graduate School of Business alumni Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award laureates Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Goldman Sachs people