Thomas H. Lee, a pioneer of private-equity financing for restaurant companies and other consumer goods concerns, has died at age 78.
The long-time financier was found dead Thursday morning in his New York City offices from what authorities believe was a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to multiple local media reports.
The police have not revealed additional details.
Lee was chairman of Lee Equity Partners, the firm he formed in 2006 after splitting with partners in his initial investment business, Thomas H. Lee Partners.
He had launched his first namesake company in 1974, long before private-equity investing would become a familiar means for medium-sized companies to accelerate their growth. Thomas H. Lee Partners would go on to invest in a number of restaurant operations, including Restaurants Unlimited, parent at the time of the deal of the Cinnabon bakery chain, the Palomino polished-casual group, and a number of one-off full-service concepts.
He was also a minority investor in New York Restaurant Group, the fine-dining operation run by TGI Fridays founder Alan Stillman. That brand had been spun off long beforehand, leaving the group with Smith & Wollensky, Manhattan Ocean Club and Mrs. Parks Café.
The investment firm’s biggest restaurant deal was its acquisition in 2006 of the beverage and baked-goods chain now known as Dunkin’. Lee teamed up with Bain Capital, then run by Mitt Romney, and The Carlyle Group to buy the franchise chain for $2.43 billion in cash. At the time, the deal was believed to be the largest acquisition ever attempted in the restaurant industry.
The deal was quickly followed by other big purchases of restaurant companies by private-equity firms, including the $3.2 billion acquisition in 2007 of Outback Steakhouse’s parent OSI Partners by Bain and the private-equity firm Catterton Partners.
That same year, Thomas H. Lee Partners participated in the $8.3 billion deal that took the Aramark contract-services firm private.
Lee also purchased stakes in such well-known consumer brands as Snapple, Gillette, Playtex, Ghirardelli, Nielsen and First Alert. The investments were part of the wave of private-equity money that flowed into many industries, restaurants included, during the first two decades of the current century.
“The family is extremely saddened by Tom's death,” family spokesman Michael Sitrick said in a prepared media release. “While the world knew him as one of the pioneers in the private equity business and a successful businessman, we knew him as a devoted husband, father, grandfather, sibling, friend and philanthropist who always put others' needs before his own. Our hearts are broken."
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