Sir Ronald Alfred Brierley (1937

(1937-) Businessman born in Wellington, New Zealand. Educated in Wellington, in 1961 founded Brierley Investments, becoming its' Chairman (1961-1969) and President (1989-). This was an entrepreneurial enterprise designed to aquire control of already substantial companies and to improve their commercial performance. Following a program of audacious but generally well planned takeovers and mergers, and rejecting the perjorative label of "corporate raider" he built his firm into a multibillion dollar operation.

By the time he resigned as Chairman, BIL had extensive interests in Australia, Britain, USA, and New Zealand. He became chairman of Tozer Kemsley and Millbourn (Holdings) in 1986 and was Knighted in 1988.

See Source: The Cambridge Biographical Encyclopedia, Cambridge University Press, pg 144., - 1994

In 1997, Sir Ronald Alfred Brierley has regained the $100 million mark that he first passed more than a decade ago. The share price of Brierley Investments Limited, the company he founded in New Zealand in 1961, plunged in the 1987 stockmarket crash. Today, BIL is again a formidable market force. Brierley remains on the board, but has had no management role since a palace revolt after the crash. Guinness Peat Group is his main corporate interest. Brierley has had an interest in the stockmarket since he was a youth.