Randolph David "Randy" Lerner is an American entrepreneur and sports team
owner. He was the majority owner of the American football team, the Cleveland
Browns, of the National Football League upon the death of his father Alfred "Al"
Lerner in October 2002, until August 2012, and was the chairman of Aston
Villa Football Club of the Premier League from 2006 to 2014. His personal
fortune was estimated at GBP over 1.1 billion.
Biography = Early life =
Lerner graduated from Columbia University in 1984, spending 1983 at
Clare College in Cambridge, England. He graduated from Columbia Law School and
is a member of the New York and District of Columbia Bar Associations. Prior to
entering the business world, he worked as a lawyer in New York City.
= Business history = Lerner's business career began at the
Progressive Corporation as an investment analyst. In 1991, he started an
independent investment firm with Progressive capital called Securities
Advisors, Inc., which he owned and managed until 2001. SAI initially
specialized in arbitrage before shifting its focus to equity investing.
His father Al Lerner became chairman of MBNA Corporation investing $800 million
of his own money in the initial public offering of the corporation. In 1993,
Randy became a director at MBNA. Upon the death of his father on October 23,
2002, Randy became company chairman. He was involved in the sale of MBNA
Corporation on January 1, 2006 to Bank of America for $35 billion.
= Sports team ownership = Cleveland Browns
Control of the Browns was given to Lerner, when his father, Al Lerner, died
in October 2002 – four years to the day after he was awarded the new Browns
franchise. Lerner also served as a member of the National Football League's
Business Ventures Committee. Lerner was generally a low-key owner during the
time he controlled the Browns franchise. In 2012, Lerner sold the team to
businessman Jimmy Haslam. Aston Villa
During his time at Cambridge Lerner followed English football, taking an
interest in three teams: Arsenal, Fulham and Aston Villa. Although he had grown
up in the United States, with a father who had been involved with the Cleveland
Browns franchise under Art Modell, Lerner's interest in England's top
flight endured long after he had returned to the States. On July 24, 2006
it was reported that Randy Lerner intended to purchase Premier League club
Aston Villa following a statement from Cleveland Browns management indicating
Lerner was pursuing business interests in the United Kingdom. Lerner pulled out
of the bid to buy Aston Villa two days later after talks with the club chairman
Doug Ellis broke down but the following day reports emerged that Lerner might
still make a formal £64 million bid for the club.
On August 14, 2006 it was confirmed that Lerner had reached an agreement of £62.6
million with Aston Villa for a takeover of the club. The statement to the London
Stock Exchange confirmed that 60% of the club's shares, including the 39% stake
of Doug Ellis had been sold to Lerner, beating competition from consortia led
by Michael Neville, Nicholas Padfield QC, and Athole Still. At this stage, the
sale still awaited the approval of the shareholders of Aston Villa, although it
was expected to be approved without a hitch.
On August 25, the LSE announced that Lerner had secured 59.69% of Villa
shares, making him the majority shareholder. He also appointed himself
Chairman of the club. The BBC reported on September 5, 2006
that Lerner had now moved closer to taking full control of the club, after
increasing his share to 85.5%. By the time that the September 18 1pm
deadline had been reached Lerner had acceptance of 89.69% of the share. Due
to the acceptance only being 0.31% below the conditional limit, Lerner accepted
it and made the bid unconditional. On September 19, 2006 Aston Villa PLC
executive Chairman Doug Ellis and his board resigned, to be replaced by Randy
Lerner as Chairman and General Charles C. Krulak, Bob Kain and Michael Martin
as non-executive directors. At the close of the deal in 2006, Lerner became the
second American owner of a Premiership club.
In June 2011, Lerner controversially appointed manager Alex McLeish from
local rivals Birmingham City, only to fire McLeish barely a year later. He
replaced McLeish with then Norwich City manager Paul Lambert. He invested about
£20m into the club on March 2013 and waived off the £100m interest owed to
him by Aston Villa due to the fact Villa were struggling financially. On May
12th, 2014, Lerner announced he had put the club up for sale, stating, "I owe it
to Villa to move on, and look for fresh, invigorated leadership, if in my heart I
feel I can no longer do the job." At the end of the 2015 calendar year,
the english club sat bottom of the Barclays Premier League, and many of the
club's supporters have turned against Lerner in the past few years due to a
perceived lack of interest, lack of investment and poor appointments of
managers and other senior club figures, such as the club's CEO Tom Fox. With
relegation posing a severe threat at one the country's most historic and
successful football clubs, and huge numbers of fans and former players
expressing their discontent and anger at the way the club is being run, it
remains to be seen what action would be taken should Aston Villa drop into the
Sky Bet Championship. = Philanthropy =
Randy Lerner has supported the National Portrait Gallery since 2002. On January
23, 2008 it was announced that he had donated £5 million to the gallery, the
largest single donation that it has ever received. In recognition the ground
floor galleries will be named "The Lerner Galleries".
For the 2008/2009 and 2009/2010 seasons, Aston Villa forwent traditional shirt
sponsorship by instead wearing on their shirts the name of a local children's
hospice, Acorns. For the 2010/2011 season this sponsor was replaced by
corporate sponsor FxPro, however the club continued to promote Acorns on all
children's kits as the club's official charity partner.
Randy Lerner also provided a substantial gift to Clare College, Cambridge to fund
the building of a new block of residential student accommodation,
Lerner Court. = Personal =
Lerner has a house in Amagansett, New York where he owns the Community Square
shopping complex as well as the Meeting House Restaurant in the complex. The
Wall Street Journal reported that Cleveland Browns Transportation was the
most frequent flyer in and out of East Hampton Airport with 390 trips logged
between 2007 and 2011. References