Word: bendix
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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PITY POOR William M. Agee. The brash, 44-year-old chairman of Bendix Corp. thought he had wrapped up one of the biggest business deals of all time last month when Bendix made a hefty $1.5 billion bid for the promising Martin Marietta Corp. But Marietta fought the unfriendly bid, other industrial giants stepped into the fray, and in the end the tables were turned on Agee A third company, Allied Corp., bought Bendix last Friday, turning Agee from conqueror to conquered in the space of a month...
...bloody Bendix-Marietta saga should dispel any sanguine impressions. The two giants slugged it out toe-to-toe for 31 days, and the well-publicized battle, "at various times...threatened to destroy Marietta or Bendix, or both," according to The New York Times. At one point in late August, it looked like each would succeed only in buying each other's shares, a kind of corporate analog to the mutually fatal duel of Hamlet and Laertes. The two companies--and a pair of other preying conglomerates--spent millions of dollars on legal and financial fees, while diverting the financial community...
...Bendix's unenviable position results to some degree from the animosity toward Agee in the business community. In the tight-knit world of top management in corporate America, Agee is an unwelcomed outsider. This is due at least partly to his relationship with Mary Cunningham, 31, a former Bendix vice president who resigned in October 1980 in the wake of charges that she was having a romance with Agee. After denying the accusation at the time, the two married last June. That episode still haunts Agee. Says one of Wall Street's most prominent merger makers...
Nonetheless, no one belittles Agee's bottom-line success. Since he became chief executive of Bendix in 1976, the firm's annual operating profits have more than doubled, to $205 million last year. If United Technologies acquires Bendix, some company insiders speculate that Gray, who is expected to retire in three years, might ask Agee to stay on as heir apparent. One of his competitors for that spot could be Alexander Haig, who left his post as president of United Technologies to become Secretary of State but returned last week as a consultant...
...matter what happens now, Agee will come out of the takeover battle a wealthy man. If either bid for his company goes through, the Bendix stock that Agee holds will be worth at least $1 million. In addition, Bendix's board of directors voted last week to give the firm's top 16 executives so-called golden-parachute contracts. In Agee's case, this action guarantees him severance pay of about $4 million if he is fired by new management...