Career
Wasserstein helped broker more than a thousand transactions worth $250 billion since the 1980s. Starting his career as a Cravath, Swaine & Moore attorney, he later rose to co-head of First Boston Corp.'s dominant merger and acquisition practice. He eventually formed investment bank boutique Wasserstein Perella & Co., which he sold in 2000, at the top of the 1990s bull market, to Germany's Dresdner Bank for around $1.4 billion in stock. He left the unit Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein (formed by merging Dresdner's United Kingdom unit Kleinwort Benson with Wasserstein Perella) to take the job at Lazard Frères. In 2005, he completed the initial public offering for Lazard.
Wasserstein controlled Wasserstein & Co., a private equity firm with investments in a number of industries, particularly media. In 2004, he added New York Magazine to his media empire. In July 2007, he sold American Lawyer Media to Incisive Media for about $630 million in cash. He is credited with the term, Pac-Man defense, which is used by targeted companies during a hostile takeover attempt.
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