Ladell Robbins

Managing Director, Head of the BlackRock’s Impact Opportunities Fund at BlackRock

Speaker

Ladell Robbins, Managing Director, is the Chair of the Investment Committee and Head of the BlackRock Impact Opportunities Fund (“BIO”), a multi-strategy fund which seeks to improve economic outcomes for undercapitalized communities in the United States. He joined BlackRock in 2021 and works within the Private Markets division.

Ladell has over 25 years’ experience in financial services in the US, Europe and Africa, with transactional experience in M&A, ECM, DCM and principal investments. Prior to joining BlackRock, Ladell was the Chief Financial Officer and Chief Investment Officer of Invest Newark, a NJ non-profit corporation which promotes inclusive economic development in the City of Newark, NJ. Ladell has served as a Principal and Head of Fast-Moving Consumer Goods and Agribusiness Investments for African Capital Alliance, one of Sub-Saharan Africa’s largest private equity funds; as the Founder of BlueSky Partners LLC, a West-African real estate and agribusiness investment firm; and as a Director of Doreo Partners, a Nigerian agriculture impact investment firm. Ladell has also worked in the investment banking divisions of Renaissance Capital (London and Lagos), Credit Suisse (London), J.P. Morgan (New York) and the M&A division of Lucent Technologies (Murray Hill, NJ).

Ladell serves on the board of New Jersey Community Capital and he is the Treasurer of the Harvard Business School African American Alumni Association. Ladell has previously served on the boards of two leading West African consumer businesses, during his time as a private equity executive in West Africa and recently served as a Director of the North Carolina Botanical Garden Foundation. Ladell enjoys running and has completed nine marathons and one ultramarathon.

He holds a B.A. in Economics with a Minor in Business Administration from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where he was a Morehead-Cain Scholar and earned his MBA from the Harvard Business School.