[/floatr]The Wall Street Journal: Giuliani's Profitable Partnership
A partnership Rudy Giuliani forged with a wealthy diamond-trading family from Israel helped his effort to expand his fledgling consulting business in Japan, and generated more than $600,000 in speaking fees for the Republican presidential candidate. The former New York mayor's previously undisclosed relationship with the Sage Capital Growth...shows how money came his way after he earned international acclaim leading the city through the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks...In addition to large speaking fees that went directly to Mr. Giuliani, the Sage relationship helped his firm expand into a foreign market where he and his team of ex-New York City criminal justice, municipal and fire department officials lacked experience...They went beyond their core security expertise to work with companies in sectors ranging from condominiums to alternative energy -- though their promises to help Japanese companies to expand sometimes fell flat. Two of the Japanese companies Sage invested in prominently posted photos of the former mayor posing with their executives. "At the beginning, there was some hope this would lead to something bigger, but that just didn't materialize," said Nobuyuki Omori, an investor relations manager at Digital Garage Inc., an Internet firm the Sage-Giuliani partnership had vowed to help expand. At one point, Mr. Giuliani was slated to head a Sage-funded philanthropy alongside major business leaders in the U.S. and Japan, though that effort is now dormant...In 2005, Sage invested 100 million yen in Tokyo-based Green Power Investment Corp., which develops alternative energy projects, such as wind farms. Toshio Hori, the head of Green Power, had his photo taken with Mr. Giuliani, which still appears on Green Power's Website. But Mr. Hori said beyond the photo op, his firm didn't see much of Giuliani Partners. Sage later asked Green Power to remove Mr. Giuliani's name from its Web site. "To me it looks like Sage just made use of Giuliani's face for their business," Mr. Hori said...more...
The article say that his relationship with Sage Capital Growth was "previously undisclosed". Giuliani may not have listed it in his financial report but it was public enough to warrant this FG post on the Digital Garage deal three years ago. Gen Kanai's entry on the relationship from the same time also ranks at the top of a quick google search.
