Word: southwesterner
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...Texas League Squeeze Play. One of Perot's best accounts was the Southwestern Life Insurance Co., which he inherited in 1958 from fellow salesman Jim Cox, who was promoted to a post in California. Some months earlier, Cox had received an order from Southwestern for a 7070 computer, then IBM's largest commercial unit. Perot had 90 days either to declare the deal dead (and get Cox to return a $10,000 partial commission) or to agree to try to install the machine himself for what was known as an installation commission. If he accepted the risk and failed, however...
...bitterly recalls that just as the 90-day period was ending, Perot demanded that Cox return his commission. "The account required almost constant attention, and Ross just let the deal die," says Cox, who feels that Perot then "would have resold ((the computer)) to Southwestern in a few months and kept 100% of the money. He was extremely devious...
Making Soup of Campbell. When Perot finally installed the 7070 at Southwestern, he received roughly $25,000 as a commission, which he wanted to keep for himself -- to the consternation of his IBM partner, Dean Campbell. When the two first started working as a team in the late 1950s, they shared 20 insurance-company accounts. Perot agreed to work on two large, difficult accounts -- including Southwestern -- while Campbell would take the rest. Perot told his boss that he should not split the Southwestern commission with Campbell because he had done all the work. In response, Campbell argued that Perot didn...
Lining Up His Ducks. One former salesman, Ted Smith, now 59, recalls that shortly before Perot left IBM, he admitted to Smith that he had three contracts already signed up -- with GRC, Southwestern Life and Blue Cross-Blue Shield of Texas. A former IBM executive maintains that he has firsthand knowledge that before quitting, Perot sold additional IBM equipment to at least two of those entities, collected sales commissions and then had those firms cancel the orders once he left IBM. What's not known, he adds, is whether Perot had these clients lined up when he sold them...
Being aware offers little protection to those who fall prey to the kissing bug in Southwestern states. The dark brown insect, featuring a protruding proboscis and a splash of orange at the edge of its wings, strikes at night, quietly feasting on the blood of the slumbering victim. Most involuntary donors awaken the next morning itching from what seems to be a mosquito bite. But some immediately develop alarming and occasionally fatal allergic symptoms. Dr. Jacob Pinnas of the University of Arizona suggests that kissing- bug deaths may be underestimated. Some people who die in their sleep and have their...