Jørgen Vig Knudstorp

Jørgen Vig Knudstorp, joined the LEGO Group in September 2001, and three years later, at the age 35, became its CEO and President, working closely with his predecessor, the 3^rd generation family owner of the LEGO Group. Jørgen stepped away from his executive role for the family owner in 2025 to work as an advisor and board member.

Thanks to the family ownership and insightful leadership across a broader group of leaders, the LEGO Group today is more than 10 times larger than in 2004. In the last third of his years with the owner family, Jørgen was the executive chair of the LEGO Brand Group together with the 4th generation family owner. Together they oversaw the protection and development of the LEGO Brand across the boards of the LEGO Group, LEGO Ventures, LEGOLAND, LEGO Foundation and related activities, alternatively acting as board members, advisor, chairs and so on.  

Today, Jørgen is the deputy chair of the LEGO Foundation, which owns 25 percent of the LEGO Group and is a major actor in children’s development globally. He also chairs BrainPOP Education in NYC on behalf of the family owner investment and holding company KIRKBI and its KIRKBI Education Activities.

Jørgen is a long serving board member of Starbucks Coffee Company in Seattle, and serves as its lead independent director, after serving as its Nominating and Governance Chair since 2018. He is furthermore a partner and executive advisor to the venture firm Innovation Endeavors in Palo Alto. Also, in 2025 he joined the board of Nike Inc. 

Jørgen has on behalf of the LEGO Brand and owner family been associated with the governance of the executive education school IMD in Lausanne, Switzerland. As of 2025, he has moved on to serve as the school’s supervisory board’s independent chair.

Because Jørgen is a PhD in Economics and business, he has always had a deep interest in education and in understanding economics and business at a deeper level, and his current activities, including IMD, contribute to that. Across his portfolio of diverse activities, learning and in-depth inspiring understanding of business, economics and the wider society is central. 

Jørgen gained his “clinical practice”, as McKinsey & Co put it, when he joined their firm in 1998, having completed his PhD. He continued teaching at Aarhus University on Friday afternoons whilst at McKinsey. He left as an engagement manager in September 2001 to join the LEGO Group as head of strategic development. He continued to plan to return to a research and teaching role at a university until he in 2004 was made CEO of the LEGO Group.