Randy Lerner

Randy Lerner

Randolph G. "Randy" Lerner (born February 21, 1962 in Brooklyn , New York City ) is an American businessman and owner of sports clubs. From October 2002 to 2012 he owned the Cleveland Browns, an American football club from the North American National Football League, and almost four years later acquired the football club Aston Villa from Birmingham in the English Premier League . His personal fortune was founded in 2008 to 1.5 billion US dollars estimated.

Education and business activities

Lerner earned a Bachelor of Arts / Science degree from Columbia University in 1984 . The year before, he had at the Clare College in English Cambridge spent, where he first maintained a close contact with the football and interest in the clubs Arsenal , Fulham and Aston Villa had developed. After graduating with a Bachelor of Laws from Columbia Law School , he was admitted to the bar in the District of Columbia and initially worked as a lawyer .

Lerner took his first steps in the business world as a financial analyst for the insurance company Progressive Corporation . In 1991 he founded the independent investment company "Securities Advisors, Inc." (SAI) with capital from Progressive Corporation, which initially specialized in arbitrage and later focused on securities trading. Lerner was the managing director and owner of SAI until 2001. In addition, in 1993 he held a director position at MBNA , which his father Al Lerner had founded and built up. Lerner headed the bank holding company until his death in 2002 and then became chairman.

Investment in sports clubs

After Al Lerner was able to secure the Cleveland Browns franchise in 1998 , Randy Lerner took over ownership of the NFL club after the death of his father in October 2002. He is also a member of the Business Venture Committee of the National Football League .

Despite his involvement in American sports , Learner's interest in English football had not diminished. The great success of Aston Villa in 1982 was also deeply impressed on the businessman's memory, as the team had won the European Cup in the year of Learer's stay in England . The first sign of a concrete business venture in English football came when speculation arose on July 24, 2006 in connection with Aston Villa. These came up in response to a notice from the Cleveland Browns management announcing a learner's engagement in the UK .

On August 14, 2006, Aston Villa and Randy Lerner's leadership officially confirmed that an agreement had been reached to acquire the club for £ 62.6 million. In the statement to the stock exchange of the London Stock Exchange it was reiterated that 59.69% of the association's shares (39% of which of the former chairman Doug Ellis ) had changed hands in the direction of Randy Lerner. Lerner named himself the new chairman of the club and by September 26, 2006, Lerner had completed his quota to 90%, which is when he started to buy up the shares completely. After Malcolm Glazer, Lerner became the second US owner of a Premier League club.

Charitable activities

Lerner has been supporting the National Portrait Gallery in London since 2002 . With his £ 5 million donation on January 23, 2008, he became the largest single benefactor of this art museum.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ The World's Billionaires - # 785 Randolph Lerner , accessed on Forbes.com
2. ↑ "The sell-out of English football - the hand that feeds it"  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (11 friends)  
3. ↑ "Lerner set to complete villa deal" (BBC News)
4. ↑ "Football Boss gives gallery £ 5m" (BBC News)