Bio

Richard Brail is currently a Managing Director and Head of the Technology, Media & Telecommunications advisory practice at Peter J. Solomon Company, a position he has held since joining the firm in 2009. Mr. Brail previously spent 18 years as an M&A banker at Morgan Stanley, where he specialized in advising media and communications industry clients. He has extensive public and private company M&A experience in completed transactions involving acquisitions, divestitures and strategic combinations including mergers, joint ventures and minority investments across the TMT sector. He has advised several international clients on cross border acquisitions in the U.S. and maintains relationships across the financial sponsor and venture capital communities. He also has extensive experience advising family owned businesses, Trusts & Estates and special committees of boards. Mr. Brail's recent work includes advising Starplex Cinemas on its $172 million sale to AMC Theatres; Christie's International on its acquisition of Collectrium; Newsy on its sale to E. W. Scripps; MediaNews Group on the acquisition of Journal Register to form Digital First Media; the Special Committee of the Board of Directors of American Greetings on the $814 million going-private sale to its control shareholder; National CineMedia on its sale of Fathom Events to its Founding Partners (Regal, AMC, Cinemark); Sony on the $2.2 billion acquisition of EMI Music Publishing; Barnes & Noble founder Len Riggio on the $204 million Liberty Media investment; eBay on the $2.4 billion acquisition of GSI Commerce and Thomas Nelson book publishing on its sale to HarperCollins. Mr. Brail has advised clients in all areas of the music industry including SiriusXM, Sony, EMI, Warner Music Group, Universal and Bertelsmann in transactions in music publishing, recorded music and radio and digital music distribution. He has also advised extensively in the movie theater exhibition sector including the sale of several large regional and family-owned operators, and he has advised on transactions involving content creators and distributors. Additionally, Mr. Brail has advised in the satellite/mobile communications industry, in particular across the Fixed Satellite Services sector and related industries, including on the sale of PanAmSat, the sale of Intelsat, SES’s acquisition of GE Americom and Loral’s acquisition of Telesat. Mr. Brail also works closely with PJSC's longstanding retail and branded consumer clients in evaluating digital media and e-commerce strategies and transactions. Mr. Brail lives in Chappaqua, New York with his wife and three sons