John W. Rutledge

A hotel-real estate entrepreneur and private equity investor, Mr. Rutledge is the Founder, President and CEO of Oxford Capital Group, LLC, a national real estate private equity, asset management, property management and development firm headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. He is also the Founder, President and CEO of its primary hotel operating affiliate, Oxford Hotels and Resorts, LLC. Its current portfolio includes a growing collection of upscale, upper upscale and luxury lifestyle hospitality brands including Godfrey, LondonHouse, Julian, Felix, Essex, Cass, About Last Knife (ALK), Beach, IO Supper Club, LH Rooftop, SX Skybar, Ruka and SpaBoutique. Mr. Rutledge co-founded his first company, Oxford Realty Corporation at age 24. He co-founded his second company, Oxford Capital Partners, Inc. during his second year of business school in 1994 while simultaneously completing an extended internship at the Wall Street mergers & acquisitions and merchant banking firm of Wasserstein, Perella & Co. His third company, Oxford Capital Group, LLC, a successor company to Oxford Capital Partners, Inc., was founded during the 2004-2006 timeframe. Oxford Capital was initially founded as a platform to take advantage of what he and a partner felt was a compelling secular arbitrage opportunity resulting from the dramatic overbuilding in the nation's property markets, particularly the lodging sector, in the early to mid-1990's. Oxford, its affiliates and principals have successfully sponsored, co-sponsored and/or participated in the investment, acquisition and/or development of approximately $2.5 billion of primarily hotel real estate across approximately 13,000 hotel rooms including approximately 5,000 employees generating profits of nearly $1 billion dollars for its investors. Notable Oxford projects include The Godfrey Hollywood, The Godfrey Hotel & Cabanas Tampa in Tampa Bay, Florida, LondonHouse, a luxury lifestyle hotel and two stories of upscale retail at 360 North Michigan Avenue in Chicago, The Doubletree Metropolitan and The Lexington hotel’s in New York City, The National Conference Center-Lansdowne, VA, Godfrey Hotel-Boston, The Langham Chicago Hotel at the former IBM building, The Hyatt Chicago-Magnificent Mile, Hotel Felix-Chicago, The Godfrey Hotel-Chicago, Hotel Essex, Essex on the Park Apartments, an under development lifestyle hotel at 168 North Michigan Avenue diagonally across from Millenium Park, The Hotel Cass-Chicago, Doubletree Hotel and Conference Center-Chicago North Shore, Renaissance North Shore-Chicago, Hyatt House-Northwest Chicago, The Doubletree Wilmington Hotel, The Marriott Southeast Portfolio: Charleston, Columbia and Rock Hill, South Carolina and Matthews, North Carolina. Oxford is also an investor in The Abbey Resort and Avani Spa-Lake Geneva, WI; the Aspen Club & Spa and Auberge Residences in Aspen, CO; Lakeshore Sport & Fitness Chicago and Lincoln Park; Jamestown Assisted Living; Plymouth Real Estate. Oxford was also an investor in The Pan Pacific Hotel-San Francisco, The Sir Francis Drake-San Francisco, The Hyatt Regency Jacksonville Riverfront and a portfolio of five Japanese hotels in Tokyo, Osaka, Kobe, Okinawa and Fukuoka. In his role as angel-private equity investor he has invested in a number of emerging growth companies including Argo Tea Inc., Bobtail Ice Cream Co., Cal Pacific, Health Integrated, Inc., Metropolitan Capital Bank Corporation, Nymirum, Inc., Potbelly Sandwich Works, Room Service, Inc., Sunglass Outlet, Inc., Sure Payroll, Talk3, and Top Golf. Mr. Rutledge is a member: of the advisory board (and a founding investor) of Metropolitan Capital Bank Corporation; the World President's Organization (WPO), where he was Chairman of the Global Hospitality Network, and previously Young Presidents' Organization (YPO); the Economic Club of Chicago; the Commercial Club; an Emeritus member of the Auxiliary Board of the Art Institute of Chicago; The Urban Land Institute (ULI); the Advisory Board for the Polsky Center of Entrepreneurship at the University of Chicago's Graduate School of Business; and St. Chrysostom’s Episcopal Church of Chicago. He is also a Trustee of The Chicago Architectural Foundation. A graduate of New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois, Mr. Rutledge graduated from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor with a bachelor’s degree in Economics and an emphasis in Real Estate. He received his MBA from the University of Chicago's Graduate School of Business with an emphasis in International Finance and Economics. He has also studied at Northwestern University, Harvard Business School (President’s Program) and Oxford University (Christ Church).