Ernie Brod

BGI founder Ernest Brod is a pioneer and luminary in the corporate intelligence industry. He has more than three decades’ experience in applying cutting edge forensic techniques to corporate investigations and business intelligence engagements in over 100 countries for leading law firms, corporations and financial institutions around the world.

Mr. Brod is credited with groundbreaking work in applying a variety of investigative tools on behalf of clients engaged in litigation, global asset searches, transactional due diligence, and in corporate contests. His efforts helped the field of business investigations gain acceptance from corporate America.

Having defended major corporations against the corporate raiders of the 1980s and ‘90s, Mr. Brod is widely recognized as an authority on shareholder activism, proxy contests, and hostile takeovers. He provided actionable intelligence in such high-profile corporate contests as Qualcomm-Broadcom and Allergan-Valeant.

Mr. Brod has conducted many high-profile global asset investigations. Beginning with the search for Baby Doc Duvalier’s pirated assets on behalf of the government of Haiti, he was engaged by Exxon to look for Venezuela's worldwide holdings and helped three Greek banks identify assets of the guarantors of hundreds of billions of dollars of non-performing loans.

By looking for hidden issues within companies, as well as insufficient disclosure or misrepresentation by their principals, Mr. Brod’s investigative background research has helped clients reduce the risk of fraud, as well as address Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and Anti-Money Laundering issues and terrorism financing concerns.

Mr. Brod has lectured around the world on resume fraud, asset searching, hostile takeovers, investigative due diligence, litigation intelligence, and doing business in Asia. He has been published in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Financial Times, New York Law Journal, Corporate Counsel, Corporate Secretary, Fraud Magazine, and other publications. He has led panel discussions at the New York City Bar Association and at the Federal Bar Council Inns of Court and at several law firms and corporate law departments about “The Do’s and Don’ts of Corporate Investigations,” “pretexting,” and the impact of the Hewlett-Packard case on corporate investigations.

Mr. Brod has held leadership positions in the Federal Bar Council, the American Corporate Counsel Association (now Association of Corporate Counsel), and the International Bar Association. He has been lauded for many years by Who’s Who Law as “a well-respected expert” with a “wealth of knowledge and expertise in investigative due diligence and asset searching” who “excels in tracing hidden assets.”

Prior to forming BGI, Mr. Brod introduced and led the business intelligence practice at Alvarez & Marsal. Before that, he headed Business Intelligence at Navigant Consulting and was a Director in the forensic and dispute services practice for Deloitte FAS. Earlier, he spent 17 years with Kroll as one of the leaders of its investigation and intelligence business and was a founder and CEO of Citigate Global Intelligence. He began his career as an attorney/investigator with the Federal Trade Commission and was General Counsel of Western Union International.

Mr. Brod earned a BA from Columbia College and a JD from Columbia Law School.