By Yoon Joung Lee

Chairman and CEO of Delta Private Equity Partners, Patricia Cloherty, is a manager at two venture capital funds: Apax Partners, the U.S. Russia Investment Fund and Delta Russia Fund, L.P.  


She started her first career in venture capital at Patricof & Co. Ventures, a $10 billion private equity company and now known as Apax Partners, in 1969.  She worked there as a partner and later became president and co-chair of the company.


In 1977, President Jimmy Carter appointed her as Deputy Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration.  Two years later in 1979, her husband and she founded a small business firm, Tessler & Cloherty.

In 1981, she founded and served as president for the Committee of 200, a prestigious organization of the country’s leading women entrepreneur and corporate executives. In 1991, she was appointed Chairman of an Investment Advisory Council by President George H.W. Bush.  She contributed to improve the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Small Business Investment Company.

In 1995, she was selected to the Board of the U.S. Russia Investment Fund by President Clinton with $440 million investment capital.  There, she served as the Chairman from 1998 to 2004; and from 2003 to 2006, she served as the Chief Executive Officer of its management company.

In 2007, she received an award from the Moscow Government for her efforts on the development of entrepreneurship in Russia and her contribution to establishment and support small business in the country.  In the same year, she also received the Woodrow Institute award by the Kennan Center for International Scholars who have shown their efforts on common good in their business practices.

She is currently a Trustee of Columbia University, a Trustee Emeritus of Columbia University’s Teachers College and a Trustee for Life of International House.  Also, she is a member of the Rockefeller University Council.

She graduated from the San Francisco College for Women in 1964 for her Bachelor’s degree, and earned two other Master’s degrees from Columbia University.