Fortune Formula Jim Richards rides the business frontier in search of 'Cowboy Capitalists' Gary Meek
Jim Richards is parlaying a "lifetime of experience" in business into a strategy of aggressive growth and increased profits.
By Russ Moore
G
reat fortunes are made through specialization, and kept through diversification," says Jim Richards, who is no stranger to helping build business fortunes. When Southwire founder Roy Richards Sr., ME '35, died in 1985, two of his sons—Roy Jr., 25, and Jim, 24, both Georgia Tech alumni— became CEO and president, respectively, of the Carrollton, Ga., company. They carried on in the family tradition, taking a successful $450 million company and making it a
mega-successful $1.9 billion company in 10 years. Five years ago, James C. Richards, Econ '81, started a new company to invest the family money through leveraged buyouts. That company, named simply Richards, is based in an Atlanta skyscraper overlooking Centennial Park. "We buy a controlling interest in mature companies that already dominate their markets," Richards says. "In many cases, the companies we buy have invented a product that gives them dominance. I always become the chairman of the board, and sometimes I plug in a new man as
CEO to enhance the company's management." The goal is aggressive growth, and Richards' own experience in finance is the engine that drives the ship. "We expect 45 percent per year in equity return," he says. Richards does not blanche at the pressure of maintaining such success. "It's really just a matter of financing growth rapidly. It's what we had to do at Southwire." Richards, 40, has been performing on the financial stage for most of his adult life, competing and succeeding globally. He was starting his third year of mechanical engineering at
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