Word: mergers
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...much student support, Radcliffe president Mary I. Bunting and several House masters proposed co-residential housing. But then-Harvard President Nathan M. Pusey ‘28 insisted that co-ed housing would not happen unless Harvard had full control over the Radcliffe girls, which meant an institutional merger...
Forget the accounting scandals, the CEOs fending off fraud charges, the churning stock market. The business world has become obsessed with corporate nuptials. Merger mania is back, executives are cashing out and, if history is any guide, investors should be running for cover. A couple of months ago, Kmart and Sears got engaged. Then Nextel and Sprint announced their $35 billion wedding. Johnson & Johnson is buying Guidant, a maker of medical devices, for $24 billion. Two of the splashiest deals came last week: SBC, the Baby Bell based in San Antonio, Texas, looked poised to swallow its former parent...
...talk of profits and synergies, investors would be wise to view these deals with a wary eye. Blockbuster mergers tend to be duds for stockholders of the acquiring company. In seven of the nine mergers valued at more than $50 billion, the acquirer's share price is down an average of 46% from premerger levels, according to FactSet Mergerstat, a research firm in Santa Monica, Calif. Maybe you already knew that if you're a longtime owner of Hewlett-Packard, whose stock has flatlined since the company acquired Compaq in 2002. AOL's merger with Time Warner (parent company...
...overlapping products, neither company was talking last week about cutting lines of goods. As for job cuts, the plan calls for eliminating a relatively small number--6,000 of the combined firm's 140,000 employees worldwide. That won't save billions. Another argument from deal enthusiasts: the merger will give the firms greater bargaining clout with big retail chains. "This is a response to the Wal-Martization of America," says Joseph Altobello, an analyst at CIBC World Markets. A similar case is made regarding advertising purchases--that together the brand-swollen behemoth will be able to wring more favorable...
...hardest advantage to measure is that merger buzzword synergy. "P&G knows a lot about women. Gillette knows a lot about men," Lafley told investors. "It's very simple, but it's a potent combination." Robert McDonald, a P&G senior executive, hinted to TIME at new products that could capitalize on each firm's strengths. "We have the best-selling male fragrance in Hugo Boss," he says. "How about a Hugo Boss designer razor?" Problem is, with P&G already so big, boasting more than $50 billion in sales, it needs the equivalent of a new megabrand like Tide...