Westport’s Bridgewater Associates, the hedge fund that is the town’s largest private employer, announced today it is getting a former Apple techie as co-CEO.
Jon Rubinstein: former Apple exec. Contributed photo
Jon Rubinstein, who helped oversee the development of the iMac and iPod at Apple, will formally join the firm in May, the company told clients.
He replaces Greg Jensen as part of the 10-year transition from founder Ray Dalio to lead the world’s biggest hedge fund.
Jensen, a 20-year veteran of the firm, remains as co-chief investment officer alongside Dalio and his longtime partner, Bob Prince.
Eileen Murray has served as the other co-CEO alongside Jensen, and she will stay in that role.
Jensen, 42, was long seen by Bridgewater employees and investors as an heir apparent to Dalio, but there have been tensions between the two men recently, according to The Wall Street Journal.
One of their disputes was featured in an article in the Journal in February. Jensen will remain in his position until later this year, the firm said.
Rubinstein spent 16 years working with Steve Jobs. There he earned the nickname the “Podfather” for his role in helping to create the iPod.
He has also been chief executive officer of smartphone maker Palm, and now sits on the board at Amazon.com and Qualcomm.
“Because technology is so important to us, we wanted one of our co-CEOs to be very strong in that area,” Bridgewater told clients.
“Technology is pervasively important at Bridgewater, especially since one of our major strategic initiatives in the coming years is to continue building out the systemized decision-making that has been so successful in our investment area and to extend it to our management as well.”
