Retired ESOP Lawyer & Director
Ron Ludwig practiced law in San Francisco for 26 years in a boutique law firm that specialized in employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs), corporate finance and corporate governance. He was instrumental in the development of the federal laws and regulations governing ESOPs, and he was the first professional to receive a Life Service Award from The ESOP Association. Following his retirement in 1999, Ron served on the Boards of Directors of five employee-ownership companies and invested in private equity through Ludwig Investment Partners. He has also served on the Board of Trustees of The Employee Ownership Foundation and the Board of Counselors of the Center for Economic and Social Justice.
Ron and his wife Carrie established the first endowment of an undergraduate study-away program in Duke’s history, the Ronald & Carrie Ludwig Duke in Silicon Valley Program. Situating students in the nation’s hub for innovative enterprise, the program is designed to give them an intensive four-week course experience in the creation of new ventures, both commercial and social.
Ron is a graduate of Duke University and the University of Michigan Law School. For the past eight years, he has been a student at the University of San Francisco’s Fromm Institute for Lifelong Learning, where Carrie and he endowed the Ludwig Chair in 20th Century Rock & Soul Music. They have recently established the Carrie & Ronald Ludwig Endowment for Innovation in Aging at the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine.