Alan Quasha’s Early Days at Harvard and Beyond

When Alan Quasha, now CEO of Quadrant Management, was a student at Harvard, he played on both the tennis and squash teams. Mr. Quasha was on three national championship teams while at Harvard, so the level of competition was quite high, and most likely helped to keep  him fit for years to come.

Alan went to Harvard Law and Business School simultaneously through a special joint program. When he graduated he started practicing law. Despite the fact that Mr. Quasha enjoyed working at his law firm, due to a proactive personality he decided to start his own firm.

At the age of 29, 30 years ago, Alan Quasha actually did one of the very first leveraged buyouts.

“I figured out a way to take a company private with essentially no capital. Then came the hard part: After the deal we had to make the company work. It was a very interesting experience, and I learned that there are a whole lot of things you can do to change even traditional businesses to make them more efficient and competitive, against incredible adversity, and turn them into leading companies.”

Restructuring Alan Quasha Style

In a discussion of how Alan Quasha of Quadrant Management has had such consistent success in the restructuring business for many years, Mr. Quasha described his technique.

Explaining that Quadrant Management are principals, as opposed to being merely consultants or advisors, Mr. Quasha  points out that,

“We restructure companies with ownership in mind because the process often requires making fundamental changes to the business model and laying out a strategy for where the business can go.”

When Quadrant began restructuring companies over 30 years ago there was little incentive to doing it as an agent, since there was no money restructuring a company that way. It pretty much had to be done by the management company as a principal, and that is how they still do it today.

Restructuring is more common during times of economic adversity, so Quadrant Management has been quite active in recent months.  One of the leading entertainment distribution companies, Genius Products, is, according to Alan Quasha’s terminology,  “a leader in ‘non-Blockbuster’ titles”, meaning that it deals with most entertainment mediums. Since Genius is already strong in the movie and DVD business, Quadrant is helping to involve them more in the music and game business.