Word: gm
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...together that counts. Dennis Blommers, a plant manager for Magna's Decoma division, which specializes in exterior systems, has been along for much of the company's ride to success; he now oversees 300 employees who engineer and make high-tech plastic bumper covers and grilles for Chrysler, GM and Honda at a plant near the company's headquarters in Aurora, Ont., about 20 miles north of Toronto. "Each year we get more and more into what the customers are asking for," he yells over the roar and hiss of 15 molding machines. "In the old days, a customer would...
...existing platform, but it's the carmakers who define the platform." Assemblers usually settle on one or two preferred suppliers for each model, but there is always another supplier ready to jump in if one or more of the chosen stumble. "If Magna doesn't provide the best price, GM can go down the street to somebody else," Magna's Blommers explains...
...bigger companies. Dynamit Nobel is part of Germany's Metallgesellschaft. Budd Automotive, which introduced the all-steel body in 1914, is now part of Thyssen Budd Automotive, which will soon be folded into emerging industrial conglomerate Thyssen Krupp AG. Carmakers themselves are also creating new players. Both Ford and GM have turned their component divisions into distinct profit centers with fancy names like Visteon and Delphi, and Renault and Fiat recently announced they were blending their foundry activities into a $2 billion-a-year systems supplier...
Think Hollywood is too corporate these days? It?s just getting started. Last week publicity powerhouse PMK (which handles names like Cruise, Pfeiffer, Hanks and Damon) finally consented to marry McCann-Erickson (clients include GM, MasterCard and Coca-Cola). The New York ad giant was not so much interested in PMK?s tidy profit margin -- ?We?re just chump change to them,? says Leslee Dart, one of PMK?s three partners -- as in its vast warehouse of stars. ?Celebrity icons are brands,? says John Dooner, McCann-Erickson?s CEO, ?and there may be opportunities to work with like-minded brands...
...betting against the short-term odds. No one is longing for environmentally correct transportation. But there has never been as much global political pressure to produce nonpolluting vehicles. In Asia and Europe, where noisy, gas-powered scooters are fast being outlawed, electric bicycle markets are exploding. Analysts like retired GM engineer Frank Jamerson expect even the minuscule U.S. market, led by enviroconscious California, to double this year, as it did in 1998, to a total of 30,000 bikes sold. "How deep is the market?" asks Iacocca rhetorically. "Why does a girl need a 4WD sport-utility vehicle in Beverly...