Ted Forstmann was a golfing partner of
Derald Ruttenberg at the
Deepdale Country Club on
Long Island. He arranged for Ruttenberg to meet
Henry Kravis and
Jerry Kohlberg of the start-up
Kohlberg Kravis Roberts. Kravis and Kohlberg proposed what they called a
leveraged buyout. After the two had left, Ruttenberg suggested that Forstmann could do the same himself. Ruttenberg arranged funding for Forstmann, who launched Forstmann Little & Company in 1978. The company was founded by brothers Ted and
Nick Forstmann, and
Brian Little. With the deaths of Brian Little and Nicholas Forstmann in 2000 and 2001, respectively, Ted Forstmann was the chief partner. A third brother, J. Anthony Forstmann, is a limited partner in the firm. Between its inception in 1978 to its 2014 closing, the firm made more than 30 acquisitions and significant investments returning over $14 billion in profit for its investors. Successful acquisitions included
Gulfstream Aerospace,
Topps Playing Cards,
Dr Pepper,
Stanadyne, and
General Instrument. While Forstmann settled the case for $15 million, the suit was considered a landmark, launching a series of similar actions between private equity fund managers and public entity investors. One prominent episode in the life of the company was the 1988 bidding war for
RJR Nabisco. Forstmann Little offered to acquire
RJR Nabisco, but the management (chiefly
F. Ross Johnson) instead chose
Shearson Lehman Hutton. In the end, the board of directors chose Forstmann Little's arch-rival,
Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. The episode was popularized in the book
Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco. Other headline transactions the firm participated in include
Revlon (1985), which resulted in the so-called
Revlon Duty, and
Citadel Broadcasting, of which Forstmann Little owns 27%, following a merger with
ABC Radio in 2006. In 2004, Forstmann Little acquired
IMG in a $750 million deal, and in 2005 bought
24 Hour Fitness for $1.6 billion. == Former station ==