Lenard Tessler

Lenard B. Tessler was born in Far Rockaway, New York, the youngest of three children of first-generation American parents; his father was a WWII B-17 pilot who was wounded in combat and later ran a liquor store, and the family was raised in Rockaway and Cedarhurst. He earned a bachelor's degree in accounting from the University of Miami and, working full-time, completed an MBA at Fairleigh Dickinson University. From 1973 to 1981 he practiced as a tax accountant at medium-sized and Big Eight accounting firms before moving into principal investing.

In the 1980s and 1990s Tessler built a career as an entrepreneur and buyout investor. He co-founded Walker Energy Partners, co-founded the leveraged-buyout firm Levine, Tessler, Leichtman & Co. (1987), and in 1990 founded the private equity firm TGV Partners. Through TGV he acquired Empire Kosher Poultry, Inc. — then the world's largest kosher poultry processor — and served as its Chairman and CEO, giving him hands-on operating experience alongside his investing background.

Tessler joined Cerberus Capital Management in 2001 as the first professional dedicated to direct principal investing for the firm's private-equity strategy. Over nearly two decades he helped build Cerberus's private-equity platform into a leading global franchise and rose to Vice Chairman and Senior Managing Director. He led and managed many of the firm's largest and most significant transactions and sat on numerous portfolio-company boards. In 2017 he received the Horatio Alger Award, recognizing both his business achievement and his philanthropy.

Now retired from Cerberus, Tessler founded Tessler Advisory Corp and remains active as an advisor and director. He joined BrightNight's Advisory Board in February 2023, continues to advise BAWAG, and has served as a board member of Best Egg and as Chairman of the Board of Idaho First Bank and Peak Bancorp. He and his wife, Fern Kaye Tessler (whom he married in 1980), are prominent philanthropists: he is a trustee of New York-Presbyterian Hospital (investment and finance committees), and the couple endowed the Whitney Biennial at the Whitney Museum of American Art, where Fern is a trustee and vice chairman.

• Invests as a control/private-equity principal, not an angel or seed investor — targets established operating companies where capital, governance, and operational change create value.
• Comfortable with complex, distressed, or out-of-favor situations — turnarounds, restructurings, and carve-outs across industries and geographies (a hallmark of Cerberus's strategy).
• In his own words, the businesses he backs "all share similar characteristics: a talented team, a clear vision, a differentiated approach – and the drive to change the status quo."
• Sector-agnostic but operationally hands-on — his Empire Kosher CEO tenure and multiple board seats reflect a preference for active involvement rather than passive minority stakes.
• Increasingly engaged in renewable/energy-transition investing through his BrightNight advisory role (dispatchable hybrid solar-wind renewable power).