Word: krupp
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Dates: during 1970-1970
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Tormented History. A glass-clinking round of cultural and economic socializing followed the signing, as members of the delegation that accompanied Brandt sought out their Polish counterparts. Student leaders met, Novelist Gunter Grass mingled with a group of Polish writers, and Berthold Beitz, representing the giant Krupp enterprises, conferred with leaders of the Polish Planning Commission. Nevertheless, neither Brandt nor Gomulka had any illusion that all the hatreds that have grown up between Germans and Poles over the course of 1,000 tormented years could be dispelled quickly...
...concern has again rebounded from disaster. Company officers have just reported that after five losing years Krupp showed a profit of $12 million in 1969. The firm's vast range of products-among many other things, it makes tanks and false teeth, grows orchids and owns supermarkets-yielded sales last year of $1.6 billion, compared with $1.4 billion in 1968. The financial woes have been substantially eased. Short-term debt has been reduced by roughly $100 million, to a manageable $30 million...
American Lessons. One sign of the bankers' new faith in Krupp is that last month Hermann Abs, West Germany's most powerful private banker, stepped down as chairman of the supervisory board, which was established to keep an eye on management during the switch away from family control. Abs' successor is Berthold Beitz, 56. a gregarious supersalesman who had been Krupp's general manager for 14 years. Since Beitz was the prime mover behind Krupp's disastrous financial policy, the promotion represented something of a comeback...
...Beitz is unlikely to regain direct management control from the man who is largely responsible for Krupp's resurgence: Chief Executive Gunter Vogelsang, 50. Vogelsang (his name means "bird song" in German), who comes from a family of Rhineland managers, is an icily efficient financial specialist with the sturdy build and wavy hair of an idealized halfback. He learned much of his management technique in two lengthy tours of the U.S., during which he visited IBM, National Cash Register, Bethlehem Steel, Republic Steel and other firms. A publicity-shy man with few outside interests, he regularly puts...
...Hole. At Krupp, Vogelsang has shown what can be accomplished when an outsider slips into a family firm and snips the ties that bind it to traditions. Taking charge in 1968, he quickly changed the paternalistic policy of never laying off a "Kruppianer" and never closing down a branch. He reduced the number of divisions from 23 to 14, pared the work force from 90,400 to 79,500, and sold off holdings in low-yield properties, including a hotel and department store in Essen, the Krupps' soot-filled home city. The Krupp truck plant, which lost...