Joe Tsai and Clara Wu Tsai, owners of the NBA's Brooklyn Nets and the WNBA's New York Liberty, are divorcing after 30 years of marriage.
A family spokesperson told the New York Post that Clara Wu Tsai and Joe Tsai decided to end their marriage mutually and with great respect for one another. The spokesperson said their relationship evolved over the years into more of a partnership centered on running their businesses and raising their children together, and that while they have grown apart, the divorce is amicable and their professional partnership remains strong.
Clara has been governor of the Liberty since the Tsai family bought the team from New York Knicks owner James Dolan in 2019. A year earlier, the Tsais purchased an initial stake in the Nets' parent company, Brooklyn Sports and Entertainment, before completing the acquisition from Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov at a final valuation of $3.3 billion.
The spokesperson said Joe will remain chairman and Clara will remain vice chair of Brooklyn Sports and Entertainment, with Joe staying on as governor of the Nets and Clara as governor of the Liberty. The statement added that they will continue to own and be stewards of the teams with professional management in place as they always have, and that in the long run they also plan to involve their children.
Estimates of the family's net worth range from about $9.5 billion to $12.5 billion.
Joe Tsai, 62, is a Taiwanese-Canadian billionaire philanthropist and co-founder of Chinese tech giant Alibaba Group. Clara, 60, has been a constant presence alongside her now-former husband and has grown increasingly visible in recent years.
She was a featured speaker at the 2026 Forbes Iconoclast Summit and appeared at the 2025 Met Gala alongside several Liberty players, though Joe did not attend. A year earlier, Clara delivered remarks at the team's victory parade in New York after the Liberty won the 2024 WNBA title.
Family and background
The couple has three children: daughter Alex and sons Dash and Jacob. Jacob followed his father to Yale and played on the Bulldogs basketball team last season, while Alex and Dash followed their mother to Stanford, where they each played lacrosse.
Aside from Alibaba and the Nets, Joe is known for his love of lacrosse and owns the San Diego Seals of the National Lacrosse League. According to the couple's 1996 wedding announcement in The New York Times, Clara attended Stanford and Harvard University and is the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. De-Min Wu of Lawrence, Kansas, where Dr. Wu was a professor of economics at the University of Kansas.
