Word: center
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Cash starved and struggling, Britain's Jaguar PLC has decided to take the course favored by many an aristocrat facing hard times: marrying into money. Last week, three days after Japanese investors bought a majority interest in Rockefeller Center, the 67-year-old maker of sleek, purring luxury sports cars and sedans agreed to be taken over by America's Ford Motor for $2.5 billion. The deal is likely to win approval from the required 75% of Jaguar's stockholders...
Since its cluster of art deco edifices was completed on Nov. 1, 1939, Rockefeller Center has been hailed as an urban masterpiece. Tourists flock to its ice rink to watch skaters twirl and to Radio City Music Hall to see the Rockettes do their high kicks with uncanny precision. But last week the Manhattan landmark, which houses U.S. companies ranging from General Electric to Simon & Schuster, took on a fresh symbolism. Control of the 19-building center passed into foreign hands when Japan's Mitsubishi Estate Co. agreed to pay $846 million for a 51% share of the Rockefeller Group...
...decline of ^ U.S. financial dominance and Japan's simultaneous rise. Connecticut's Democratic Senator Joseph Lieberman cited the transaction as evidence that the U.S. must redouble its efforts to become more competitive. Said he: "This year when they turn on the lights of that Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center, we Americans are going to have to come to grips with the reality that this great national celebration is actually occurring on Japanese property...
...acquisition comes amid a surge of Japanese investment fueled largely by Tokyo's $52 billion trade surplus with the U.S. In September Sony agreed to acquire Columbia Pictures Entertainment for $3.4 billion. And just three days after the Rockefeller Center sale, a consortium led by Japan's Mori Building Development paid $300 million for 85% of Houston's Four Oaks Place office center...
...deal was the second to diversify Rockefeller holdings since 1985, when the group issued a $1.3 billion mortgage on Rockefeller Center to outside investors. The mortgage holders can convert the loan into a 71.5% equity stake in twelve of Rockefeller Center's buildings in the year 2000. If the holders execute that option, Mitsubishi Estate's ownership in the storied center will slip into minority status -- and any fears that the towering Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center will be replaced by a tiny bonsai plant in Mitsubishi Center will prove to have been misplaced...