Diversified Investors appoints investment banker Theodore H. Lehman, expert on Russia, as new president

Business Wire, Dec 12, 1994

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 12, 1994--Diversified Investors Corp. (NASDAQ Bulletin Board: DVIN) announced today the appointment of Theodore H. Lehman as company president, replacing Howard B. Kesslin, who remains treasurer and a director of Diversified Investors.

Lehman joins the company after spending thirty years as an investment banker, most notably as president and CEO of T.H. Lehman & Co., a member firm of the New York and American Stock Exchanges. Its principal business was the financing of emerging high-tech enterprises through private placements and public offerings. Lehman was subsequently director of corporate finance at Spear, Leeds & Kellogg, a leading Wall Street member firm.

Since 1988, Lehman has been working independently in Russia advising Russian and U.S. firms on privatization opportunities and the transfer of high technology from the former Soviet Union to the West and Western technology to Russia.

"Ted Lehman is uniquely qualified, through his knowledge of critical capital formation and unparalleled contacts and hands-on experience in the emerging post-Soviet enterprise economy, to lead Diversified Investors profitably into this dynamic new free market," said Philip S. Budin, company chairman.

Among his main duties as president of Diversified Investors, Lehman will attempt to create joint ventures with Russian banks and industrial enterprises to provide electronic switching and transaction processing systems for bank and private label debit cards, credit cards and smart cards.

Lehman studied Russian language, history and Soviet political economy at the University of Wisconsin from 1949-54, at the U.S. Department of Defense Language School in Monterey, Calif. from 1954-55 and under a post-graduate Ford Foundation grant at the Russian Institute of Columbia University from 1957-60.

Diversified Investors Corp., through its wholly owned subsidiary Transaction Network Plus Inc. (TNPI), has been processing debit and credit card transactions since 1990. TNPI also provides electronic switching and transaction processing for leading U.S. banks and works with Visa, MasterCard, Maestro and NYCE. In addition, TNPI has developed point-of-sale software for Dassault Electronique Inc., U.S. subsidiary of the French aviation and electronics giant.

CONTACT: Diversified Investors Corporation, New York

              Philip S. Budin, 212/509-5000
                         or
              The Cavior Organization Inc., New York
              Warren J. Cavior or Samuel S. Cavior, 212/687-6070