The Board of Trustees of TIAA-CREF today named Herbert M. Allison, Jr. (fifty-nine) chairman, president, and chief executive officer. He will officially succeed John H. Biggs, who is retiring from the company after 13 years of service, on November 1.

Allison is currently president and chief executive of AllLearn.org, a non-profit venture of Oxford, Stanford and Yale universities. Formerly, he was President of Merrill Lynch & Co., where he retired as president and chief operating officer in July of 1999.

"Herb Allison is the ideal choice for chairman, president, and CEO of TIAA-CREF," Biggs said in a press release. "We could not be happier to have someone of his caliber. He has an excellent grasp of the issues facing TIAA-CREF as the result of his unusual breadth of experience in financial services and higher education."

TIAA-CREF has some 80 years experience serving the educational-research market segment, which represents the bulk of its assets, said a spokesman for the company.

Allison also chairs the new federal agency, the Vietnam Education Foundation. Allison was a board member of the National Association of Securities Dealers and Nasdaq. In 1999 and 2000, he served as national finance chairman for the presidential primary campaign of Senator John McCain.

"The opportunity to lead TIAA-CREF in serving its participants is an exciting and inspiring challenge," Allison said in a release. "The company is well positioned for impressive growth in serving the educational community and, increasingly, the general public."

TIAA-CREF reports $259 billion in assets under management and approximately 2.5 million participants via more than 15,000 institutions.  

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