White Firm With Weaker Resume Got Better AT&T Retail Deal: Amended Complaint
Though Legacy Equity Advisers, a Black-owned private equity firm, was “more qualified” than Blue Link Wireless, a firm owned and operated by former AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, AT&T gave its former white CEO “a more favorable deal” to buy its…
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88 retail stores, alleged Legacy’s first amended racial-animus complaint Friday (docket 3:23-cv-00979) in U.S. District Court for Northern Texas in Dallas. U.S. District Judge Sidney Fitzwater’s Sept. 15 order dismissed most of Legacy’s racial-discrimination claims as time-barred but granted Legacy leave to amend to expand on its allegations that AT&T gave Blue Link preferable treatment because it was white-owned (see 2309180027). CIC Partners and St. Cloud Capital -- Legacy’s investors in the 88 stores -- were “financially stronger” than Stephenson, Blue Link’s principal investor, said the amended complaint. “Long-standing institutions” like CIC Partners and St. Cloud Capital “have stronger access to capital than an individual investor” like Stephenson, it said. Legacy’s management team also “was better suited” than Blue Link’s “to manage and operate the retail stores,” it said. Legacy’s proposed CEO, Kevin Gleason, has more cellular retail experience than his Blue Link counterpart, Saad Nadhir, it said. Gleason had various senior executive roles at Sprint, including as regional president of more than 1,000 stores, and as vice president-national retail, it said. Nadhir’s leadership experience, by contrast, “is more heavily weighted towards restaurant franchises,” it said. Legacy’s proposed chief operating officer, Michael Loney, has more than two decades of experience “leading sales operations teams in the telecommunications industry,” said the amended complaint. During his time at Sprint, Loney was the director-sales operations, company-owned retail, with responsibility for leading more than 1,400 stores, it said. Loney’s Blue Link counterpart, Executive Vice President Glenn Hatcher, previously had "an array of non-retail roles at AT&T, including in sales and distribution, marketing, and corporate events,” it said. Hatcher appears to have secured his position at Blue Link “because he was a friend and former AT&T colleague” of Stephenson, it said.