Who

Blau is president of The Related Companies, one of the largest real estate development companies in New York. Barely 40, he is poised to take over the $15 billion company when his boss, Steve Ross, retires.

Backstory

The son of a plumbing contractor from Bayside, Queens, Blau first dabbled in real estate as an undergrad at Michigan, purchasing properties around Ann Arbor and turning them into student housing units. It was small potatoes, but it was entrepreneurial enough to impress legendary Related chairman (and Michigan alum) Steve Ross, who met Blau after stopping by campus to give a speech. Blau was offered an internship at the company, and he soon parlayed it into a part-time job, which he held on to even as he studied for an MBA at Wharton. In 1993, he joined Related full-time; by 1995 he was upped to executive vice president and placed in charge of the firm's New York development division, where he had a hand in the construction of high-end residential buildings like One Union Square South, Tribeca Green, and Tribeca Park. Now the company's president, Blau is focused on Related's more elaborate ground-up developments. And although he's only 40—making him considerably younger than vice chairman David Wine and CFO Michael Brenner—Blau's widely expected to replace the nearly septuagenarian Ross when he retires.

Of note

The biggest development that Blau has helped shepherd to date is the $1.7 billion Time Warner Center. But Related will soon break ground on an even more massive project: The firm is set to build 12 million square feet worth of office and residential towers on the 26-acre site known as Hudson Yards, which the company acquired from the MTA for $1 billion in May 2008. Other projects underway include The Caledonia, a Clodagh-designed luxury residential building abutting the High Line; a 62-story building in Chicago called 340 on the Park; a $394 million mall on the site of the Bronx Terminal Market; City Place, a $600 million mixed-use development in West Palm Beach; and the 40-story Robert A.M. Stern-designed The Century at One Century Drive in Los Angeles.

For the record

Related has always been fond of high-profile marketing schemes: To wit, the company was the first landlord to allow tenants to pay their rent with their American Express card. Now that Related owns the Equinox gym chain—it plunked down $505 million to acquire the company last year—the hope is that the prospect of gleaming Equinox gyms will draw tenants to its new developments.

Personal

Blau's wife, Lisa, is a co-founder of a juice-promoting e-newsletter called Vital Juice Daily. In 2008, Blau sold his 3,160-square-foot penthouse at Related's the Chatham on East 65th Street and paid $21 million for Scott Bommer's 11-room co-op at 1040 Fifth.