|
NBC
landmarks
RKO
|
This
note deals with RCA and GE.
It covers -
introduction
As the discussion of NBC elsewhere
on this site has suggested, NBC (and other media interests
such as RKO) have been situated
at the heart of the US 'financial-industrial complex',
associated for much of their existence with the GE electrotechnical
colossus and major financial interests such as those centred
on the pre-1930s Morgan banking group.
General Electric
GE dates from the 1892 merger of Edison General Electric
(embodying most of Thomas Edison's electrical patents)
with competitor Thomson-Houston. The group initially encompassed
lighting, gramophone, motor (particularly for streetcars),
electricity generation and transmission interests but
within a decade had expanded into machinery for business
and domestic appliances. By 1912 it had assets of around
US$132 million, annual sales of around US$89 million and
60,000 staff.
In 1905 GE formed Electric Bond & Share (EBASCO) to
finance establishment and growth of electricity utilities.
The group subsequently became one of the three dominant
US gas and electricity utility holding companies - with
control of eg American Power & Light, Idaho Power,
Pennsylvania Power & Light, Texas Power & Light,
Montana Power and Florida Power & Light - before spinning
off its assets after 1943 following the Supreme Court's
decision in Electric Bond & Share v SEC affirming
the 1938 Public Utility Holding Co Act. EBASCO
also expanded through investment in Latin America and
other regions. GE distributed EBASCO's stock to its shareholders
in 1924.
GE and the NBC takeover
GE
had revenue in 2003 of US$134.7bn, earnings of US$15.1bn
and assets of US$575bn, with around 315,000 employees
in over 100 nations. It ranks as the 5th largest US company
by sales and is the 8th largest in the world. GE Capital,
which accounts for over 50% of the group’s profits,
would rank as the 9th largest company in the US and 30th
largest in the world.
Following the NBC Universal deal GE has been continuing
to acquire and dispose of substantial assets, with for
example acquisition of the UK-based Amersham radiopharmaceuticals
group in 2003 for US$9.5bn.
As of June 2004 GE comprises
-
Capital
- Appliances
- Industrial
Products and Systems
- Medical
Systems
- Power
Systems
- Aircraft
Engines
- Advanced
Materials
- Technical
Products and Services
- NBC
GE Capital embraces consumer credit cards, equipment leasing,
health insurance, home mortgages, airplane leasing, consumer
lending, commercial lending, large project financing and
financial guaranty insurance. The Medical Systems Division
includes magnetic resonance, ultrasound, and computed
tomography scanners; patient monitoring systems; clinical
information systems and the Patient Channel, a television
network aimed at the captive audience in hospitals.
GE
Power Systems products include nuclear reactors, turbines,
compressors and generators. It also provides fuel and
support services and equipment that supports oil and gas
distribution. The Aircraft Engines Division manufactures
and services jet and turboprop engines, along with marine
engines and industrial power sources.
GE
Advanced Materials encompasses GE Plastics (high performance
polymers, plastics compounding, and sheet and films),
GE Silicones (adhesives and sealants for industries ranging
from construction to aerospace to healthcare), and GE
Quartz (material for semiconductors, lamps, fibre optics
and crucibles).
RCA
[under development]
The history of RCA parallels that of Westinghouse:
stunning early success followed by a mix of technological
innovation, engineering excellence and strategic indirection
as executives wandered on a diversification safari rather
than maintaining existing markets and fending off expansion
by Japanese and European consumer electronics groups such
as Matsushita and Electrolux.
RKO
The Radio Keith Orpheum film group - more commonly known
as RKO and distinguished by its radio transmission tower
logo - integrated feature film production, distribution
and exhibition at the height of the 'studio system'. It
was was formed in 1929 when RCA merged its film interests
with the Film Booking Office (FBO) studio and KAO, absorbing
Pathe Exchange in 1930 and became
the distributor for Disney.
In 1948, amid jitters about dismantling of the studio
system and demands for investment in television RCA sold
a controlling stake to Howard Hughes.
Hughes
exited in 1955, splitting RKO into RKO Pictures (a production
and operation operation) and RKO Theaters (real estate
and cinema operations). RKO Pictures was sold to General
Teleradio, an arm of emerging conglomerate General Tire
& Rubber, for US$25 million. In 1959 it was rebadged
as RKO General Inc, exploiting its film library (with
many features ultimately acquired by Ted Turner)
and selling its studios to Desilu Productions. General
Teleradio subsequently expired in controversy over alleged
impropriety at its television broadcasting stations. RKO
Theaters was absorbed by Cineplex Odeon.
RKO and its successors are considered
in a more detailed profile elsewhere on this site.
studies
There's been no comprehensive history of General Electric
and much of the coverage comprises triumphalist biographies
of figures such as Welch or Owen Young.
For its significance in technological development see
Bernard Carlson's Innovation as a Social Process: Elihu
Thomson & the Rise of General Electric, 1870-1900
(Cambridge: Cambridge Uni Press 1991), Leonard Reich's
The Making of American Industrial Research: Science
& Business at GE and Bell, 1876-1926 (Cambridge:
Cambridge Uni Press 1985) and George Wise' Willis R
Whitney: General Electric & the Origins of US Industrial
Research (New York: Columbia Uni Press 1985). A perpective
on EBASCO is provided by Jose Gomez Ibanez' 1999 The
Future of Private Einfrastructure: Lessons from the Nationalisation
of Electric Utilities in Latin America, 1943-1979
(PDF)
and Louis Brandeis' Other People's Money, available
here.
Ronald Kline's Steinmetz: Engineer & Socialist
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Uni Press 1992) is an account
of the leading technocrat. For 'Neutron Jack' Welch see
Welch: An American Icon (New York: Wiley 2001)
by Janet Lowe, The New GE: How Jack Welch Revived
an American Institution (New York: McGraw-Hill 1992)
by Robert Slater and Jack: Straight From the Gut
(New York: Warner 2001) by Jack Welch & John Byrne
- boys with very large toys. There is a less ebullient
account in Thomas O'Boyle's At Any Cost: Jack Welch,
General Electric & the Pursuit of Profit (New
York: Random 2001).
David Nye's Image Worlds: Corporate Identities at General
Electric, 1890-1930 (Cambridge: MIT Press 1985) and
Thomas Hughes' Networks of Power: Electrification
in Western Society, 1880-1930 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins
Uni Press 1983) are exemplary. A point of reference is
provided by Astrid Zipfel's Public Relations in der
Elektroindustrie - Die Firmen Siemens und AEG 1847 bis
1939 (Cologne: Böhlau Verlag 1997).
The major history of RCA is Robert Sobel's RCA
(New York: Stein & Day 1986). Benjamin Aldridge's
The Victor Talking Machine Co (New York 1964) offers
a view of RCA's roots. Context is provided by The
Global Jukebox: The International Music Industry
(London: Routledge 1996) by Robert Burnett, An International
History of the Recording Industry (London: Cassell
1998) by Pekka Gronow & Ilpo Saunio and Timothy Day's
A Century of Recorded Music: Listening to Musical
History (New Haven: Yale Uni Press 2000). Margaret
Graham's RCA & the Videodisc (Cambridge: Cambridge
Uni Press 1986) considers why RCA dropped the ball, influencing
Sony's decision to create both
content and hardware.
There is a similar account in Homer Oldfield's King
of the Seven Dwarfs: General Electric's Ambiguous Challenge
to the Computer Industry (Los Alamitos: IEEE Computer
Society Press 1996), the major study of the failure of
GE and other consumer giants to achieve success as computing
hardware/software manufacturers. It's complemented by
Simon Partner's Assembled In Japan: Electrical Goods
& The Making Of The Japanese Consumer (Berkeley:
Uni of California Press 1999) and Alfred Chandler's Inventing
the Electronic Century: The Epic Story of the Consumer
Electronics & Computer Science Industries (New
York: Free Press 2001) Jefferson Cowie's intelligent Capital
Moves: RCA's Seventy-Year Quest for Cheap Labour
(New York: New Press 1999) looks under the hood.
 next
page (NBC, GE and RCA landmarks)
|
|
