Rich resources

What led your firm to hire Richard Bressler?
We have long believed that sustaining the kinds of returns that we have consistently provided our investors requires adding value in every phase of the investment process. We add value from sourcing, to how we create and finance a deal, to the rigor of our due diligence, to working with the company itself to create value. We want to make sure that we remain at the leading edge in terms of our ability to add value in every phase.

Rich is somebody that we've known for quite a long time. In his position as CFO of Viacom and before that as CFO of Time Warner, he not only was one of the most senior executives at two of the world's largest companies, but he had a job where he was providing a high level of service and value added to a broad range of businesses. He was working with very strong, high-powered operating executives who were running the various divisions. That's exactly what we do with our portfolio companies. Our focus is on identifying good companies, making sure that we have the best operating management in an industry, creating a very detailed plan along with the operating management of that company, and then helping them – with strategy, with senior personnel decisions, with executing on the finance and M&A side – without interfering in their day to day management of the business.

What will Bressler be spending most of his time on?
He'll be active in a couple of areas. Number one, working with our deal teams and company managements to ensure that the essential infrastructure of a company is appropriate for the growth plans that we've created and are implementing. As we continue to grow these companies and as some of them prepare to become public companies, he will work with our deal teams and management to make sure that the financial, administrative and technological sides of the business are working well, and that the company is appropriately dealing with Sarb Ox and all that entails. Second, Rich's broad experience and contacts in the media and publishing sectors, areas we already have enormous knowledge of and participation in, will be very helpful in creating and managing new transactions.

We're not changing the fact that the deal teams are going to continue to work extensively with the management teams and on the boards of companies. We'll utilize Rich and other members of this group as resources in much the same way that today deal teams bring in people that we know from the outside – former CEOs and CFOs of our companies and people with an operational and functional perspective. With Rich, we're taking some of that and bringing it inside. The Strategic Resource Group is putting a name against something that we have done for a long period of time, but mobilizing those resources most effectively. It's a natural next step.

To what extent will your firm continue to use consultants?
We will continue to use a combination of internal resources plus some level of outside help for very specific data gathering tasks or functional expertise. We have very good relationships with operating people in a broad range of industries and will continue to access those resources.

What other types of professionals will you bring into the Strategic Resource Group?
It's going to be some combination of full-time people who report to Rich who perhaps bring in some consulting, accounting and other functional or operational backgrounds. There may be some people who have some other industry focus, although this is not meant to be an industry-specific group.