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Barbarians At The Gate By Kohlberg Kravis Roberts And Co.

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Barbarians at The Gate is a prominent book within the financial industry and a great book to read for a deeper look inside how the private equity world works. The book is an account of one most famous leveraged buyout cases in the history of private equity. The story is about the leveraged buyout of RJR Nabisco, Inc. by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., more commonly known as KKR, a tycoon in the private equity business in 1988. The book is written by two journalists of the wall street journal, Bryan Burrough and John Helyar and the chain of articles they wrote about during the entire longevity of the buyout process, through interviews with the key players in the deal. For anyone who is interested in the complex yet simple world of leveraged buyouts, the book is a must read to understand the nature of the deals and how anything goes and the characters and the psychology of people.
The chieftain of the book is Ross Johnson, the fiery, energetic and entertaining Chief Executive Officer of RJR Nabisco. The Canadian businessman got his start in General Electric as an accountant, after graduating from University of Manitoba in 1952, through a military scholarship. After General Electric, he moved on to T. Eaton Company where he was the Vice-President of merchandising. Shortly after, he was named president of Standard Brands Ltd. From there, Johnson began his reign to the top of the corporate ladder, by discussing a merger between his company and Nabisco with the than CEO of

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