Why every city could benefit from billionaire urbanism

Hello and welcome to Modern CEO! I’m Stephanie Mehta, CEO and chief content officer of Mansueto Ventures. Each week this newsletter explores inclusive approaches to leadership drawn from conversations with executives and entrepreneurs, and from the pages of Inc. and Fast Company. If you received this newsletter from a friend, you can sign up to get it yourself every Monday morning. The unveiling last fall of Hudson’s Detroit, a new 1.5 million–square–foot development in Detroit, came just months after Jared Fleisher was named president of Bedrock, the real estate developer that backed the project. But the project is a capstone to more than a decade of work by Bedrock, founded and chaired by billionaire Dan Gilbert, to revitalize Detroit and turn the city into an appealing home for newcomers and natives alike. “We look at the city as a product,” says Fleisher, who advised Gilbert on government affairs and economic development strategy before becoming president of Bedrock in August 2025 and CEO in December. “We’ve got to produce something that your customer wants, and our customers [are] talented young people who are the fuel of a modern economy. We want that customer to choose our city.” A vision for Detroit Hudson’s Detroit, which will include 400,000 square feet of office space, retail, an event venue with a rooftop lounge, and eventually a hotel and residences, seems tailored to an upwardly mobile, young clientele. Gilbert, whose Rock conglomerate includes Rocket Mortgage, Bedrock, and the NBA’s Cleveland Cavaliers, also wants to retain Detroiters. “Our customer definitely is what Jared said: the young, talented folks who drive the modern economy but also people who live in the city [already],” says Gilbert, who moved Rocket from the Detroit suburbs to the city in 2010. “We want them to stay here. We don’t want to lose population anymore.” Indeed, after years of decline, the city saw its population grow in 2025 to about 650,000, well below its peak of more than 1.