Joel Greenblatt is a value investor

Value investing

Value investing is an investment paradigm that derives from the ideas on investment and speculation that Ben Graham and David Dodd began teaching at Columbia Business School in 1928 and subsequently developed in their 1934 text Security Analysis...

, and adjunct professor at the Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

 Graduate School of Business

Columbia Business School

Columbia Business School is the business school of Columbia University in Manhattan, New York City. It was established in 1916 to provide business training and professional preparation for undergraduate and graduate Columbia University students...

. He is the former chairman of the board of Alliant Techsystems

Alliant Techsystems

Alliant Techsystems Inc., most commonly known by its ticker symbol, ', is one of the largest aerospace and defense companies in the United States with more than 18,000 employees in 22 states, Puerto Rico and internationally, and 2010 revenues in excess of an estimated...

 and founder of the New York Securities Auction Corporation.
Greenblatt is a graduate of the The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania

University of Pennsylvania

The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...

, receiving his B.S. in 1979 and M.B.A. in 1980.
In 1985, Greenblatt started a hedge fund, Gotham Capital, with $7 million, most of which was provided by junk-bond king Michael Milken

Michael Milken

Michael Robert Milken is an American business magnate, financier, and philanthropist noted for his role in the development of the market for high-yield bonds during the 1970s and 1980s, for his 1990 guilty plea to felony charges for violating US securities laws, and for his funding of medical...

.
Greenblatt co-founded a website with John Petry called the Value Investors Clubhttp://www.valueinvestorsclub.com/value2/, where investors approved through an application process exchange value and special situation investment ideas.