Trian Overview and History
Overview
Trian Fund Management, L.P. (“Trian” or the “Firm”) is an established multi-billion dollar alternative
investment management firm founded in 2005 by Nelson Peltz, Peter W. May and Edward P. Garden
(collectively, the “Principals”) with the objective of generating significant capital appreciation for
investors by utilizing Trian’s “operations-centric” investment strategy. Trian’s strategy involves investing
in public companies with attractive business models that Trian believes trade significantly below intrinsic
value due to operating underperformance. Trian believes that its core competency is its ability to
optimize the profitability of the companies in which it invests by working constructively with
management and the board of directors to execute Trian’s operational and strategic initiatives designed
to increase the company’s overall value. This operations-centric investment strategy has been deployed
by the Firm’s Principals over a variety of market cycles for nearly four decades.
Trian’s Principals have a long track record of implementing operational improvements through the
exercise of influence at a company, often as a result of becoming one of its largest shareholders. Trian
believes that its “reputational capital,” achieved by successfully building and improving companies, has
translated into strong and established credibility with large, institutional public equity investors who
generally support Trian’s operational and strategic initiatives. These relationships are an important
component of Trian’s ability to operate with influence without necessarily having control.
Trian Partners, headquartered in New York, NY, has approximately 50 employees, many of whom have
been with the Firm since its inception.
History*
Messrs. Peltz and May have been partners since 1972 when Mr. May became the CFO of a regional food
distributor controlled by Mr. Peltz. Mr. Peltz (later joined by Mr. May) grew that company’s revenues
from approximately $2 million to $140 million over a period of 15 years. Messrs. Peltz and May sold the
company in 1978 and subsequently created NPM Group, an operations turnaround consultant for banks
and corporations.
In April 1983, Messrs. Peltz and May acquired a strategic interest in Triangle Industries. At the time,
Triangle had an enterprise value of approximately $80 million. Messrs. Peltz and May used their
operating and financial skills to improve performance and generate strong free cash flow. They then used
Triangle as a base to build a major industrial company. Triangle acquired National Can Corporation in
1985 and then American Can Company’s packaging operations in 1986. Messrs. Peltz and May
transformed the small unprofitable industrial company into the world’s largest packaging company and,
according to Fortune magazine, the then 98th largest industrial company in the U.S., with over $4 billion
in sales. In December 1988, Triangle (with an enterprise value of approximately $4 billion) was sold to
Pechiney, S.A.
In April 1993, Messrs. Peltz and May purchased a strategic interest in DWG Corporation (subsequently
renamed Triarc Companies, Inc.). At that time, Triarc had an enterprise value of approximately $700
million and was a financially distressed conglomerate consisting of a number of underperforming
companies across unrelated sectors. These sectors included soft drinks, quick service restaurants, textiles,
propane, specialty chemicals and approximately 15 other unrelated businesses. Over the next decade,
Messrs. Peltz and May strategically grew and invested in the consumer brands (Arby’s and RC Cola) and
divested over $400 million of ancillary assets.
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Trian Overview and History (CONT’D)
Triarc’s beverage platform, Royal Crown Corporation, was transformed by Messrs. Peltz and May into a
premium beverage company through the acquisition of several businesses, including Snapple in 1997.
Despite Snapple’s significant underperformance and negative cash flows under Quaker Oats’
management between 1994 and 1997, Messrs. Peltz and May believed they could stabilize the brand’s
volume losses and restart growth. Thus in 1997, Triarc acquired the underperforming Snapple brand
(with an enterprise value of approximately $300 million) from Quaker Oats and engineered a marketing
and operational turnaround (see “How Snapple Got Its Juice Back,” Harvard Business Review, January
2002), which became a Harvard Business School case study. Between 1997 and 2000, while led by
Messrs. Peltz and May, Snapple reversed several years of dramatic volume declines by creating a leaner
organization eliminating unnecessary bureaucracy and focusing on innovative consumer marketing and
new product introductions. In 2000, Triarc sold its beverage businesses, which included Snapple as well
as three other smaller beverage brands (collectively, with an enterprise value of approximately $1.5
billion) to Cadbury Schweppes (3 years after acquiring Snapple).
In 2003, Mr. Garden joined Messrs. Peltz and May at Triarc and was instrumental in transitioning the
investment model from a public company platform to an alternative asset manager with third party
capital, culminating in the creation of Trian in 2005. While Messrs. Peltz and May had established a long
track record of buying and building companies between 1983 and 2005, they and Mr. Garden believed
larger capitalization companies offered the best risk/reward investment opportunities and that
leveraging the scale of outside capital would allow Trian to pursue such opportunities.
Thus, Trian began managing investment funds in November 2005 deploying both the Principals’ capital
and outside institutional capital with the same operations-centric investment strategy described above.
Today, Trian has nine partners: the three Principals, together with Brian Schorr, Matt Peltz, Josh Frank,
Brian Jacoby, Brian Baldwin and Greg Essner. Trian believes it has become widely regarded as a valueadded agent of change for under-performing, undervalued public companies.
SOURCE: Unaudited Trian Information
* In addition to the businesses referenced in the “History” section, Messrs. Peltz and May (and/or entities
they controlled) participated in more than a dozen other investments from 1983-2005 involving
businesses that are listed below. It should not be assumed that these investments were profitable.
Additional information is available upon request. Pre-Trian business affiliations (1972-2005) include:
Flagstaff Food Service, Triangle Industries, Inc., Avery, Inc., Rowe International, Inc., Brandt, Inc.,
Equitable Bag, Ocean View Capital, Mountleigh Group PLC, Graniteville Company, National Propane
Corporation, DWG Corporation, Triarc Companies, Inc., Snapple Beverage Group, Ascent Entertainment
Group, Inc., Encore Capital Group, Inc., Deerfield & Co., LLC, Jurlique International Pty Ltd and Arby’s
Restaurant Group.
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