About BlackRock
BlackRock employs approximately 5,600 people—including over 700 investment professionals. With offices located around the globe, we are able to offer clients in-depth local knowledge and understanding, while leveraging the strength of our global presence and infrastructure to deliver focused investment solutions. Today, BlackRock services clients in more than 60 countries.
BlackRock® is a premier provider of global investment management, risk management and advisory services to institutional and retail clients around the world. As of 30 September 2008, BlackRock's assets under management total US$1.26 trillion across equity, fixed income, cash management, alternative investment and real estate strategies. Through BlackRock Solutions® - the natural evolution of our long-standing investment in developing sophisticated and highly integrated systems - we offer risk management, strategic advisory and enterprise investment system services to a broad base of clients with portfolios totaling more than US$7 trillion as of 30 September 2008.
Since our founding in 1988, BlackRock has sought to better serve clients by anticipating and responding to changes and advancements in the investment industry, while continually seeking to broaden and deepen our investment and risk management capabilities. The most recent step in our development was the acquisition of the fund of funds business of Quellos Group, LLC, which closed on 1 October 2007. The integration of Quellos' assets into our existing fund of funds business resulted in BlackRock Alternative Advisors, a premier fund of funds platform providing hedge, private equity and real asset fund of funds to institutional and individual investors worldwide.
As we approach our twentieth anniversary, BlackRock is a truly global enterprise. We serve clients in North and South America, Europe, Asia, Japan, Australia and the Middle East. Headquartered in New York, the firm maintains offices in 19 countries around the world. Over one-third of our total assets are managed on behalf of non-U.S. investors, and nearly one-third of our employees live and work outside of the United States.
To deliver creative solutions to investment challenges, BlackRock has long focused on a cross-disciplinary team approach in which clients benefit from the pooled expertise of the firm's resources: our investment and risk management professionals and our internally developed analytical tools. In addition to excellent performance, BlackRock is committed to delivering a high level of service tailored to the needs of each client. BlackRock's client base includes corporate, public, union and industry pension plans; insurance companies; third-party mutual funds; endowments; foundations; charities; corporations; official institutions; banks; and individuals worldwide.
BlackRock is independent in ownership and governance, with no single majority stockholder and a majority of independent directors. In terms of equity ownership, Merrill Lynch's stake is approximately 49%, while The PNC Financial Services Group retains an interest of about 34%; the remaining 17% is held by BlackRock employees and public shareholders.