Mergers: Concern About Conglomerates

Charles G. Bluhdorn, chairman of merger-minded Gulf & Western, explains the rationale behind that current corporate rage—the conglomerate company—in disarmingly simple terms. "If you have all your eggs in one basket, you're stuck with those eggs," says Bluhdorn. "But if you've also got apples and bananas, that's something else." Following that formula, Bluhdorn, James Ling of Ling-Temco-Vought, Harold Geneen of ITT and several others have traced the tracks of such conglomerate pioneers as Litton and Textron across industry lines into movies and machinery, aircraft and auto parts, cigars, cybernetics and clothing. Along the way, the conglomerates have stirred up...