I promise, this is the last response to this! On Tue, May 13, 1997 at 18:03:57 (PST) Louis Proyect writes: >Meanwhile IBM is a classic study of how to get ahead in the capitalist >world by avoiding competition. Thomas Watson went to prison in the early >years of IBM because of price-fixing and industrial sabotage. In one case, >he sold malfunctioning tabulating machines with his main competition's >brand-name tagged on and put it out of business when angry customers >decided to go elsewhere. Years later he depended on the largesse of >tax-payers to fund the development of the first mainframe computers under >the auspices of the Defense Department. After the initial investment was >recovered, IBM's products began to become profitable. This has nothing to >do with the glories of the "free market". If anything, it is testimony to >the advantages of economic planning. Winfred Ruigrok and Rob van Tulder's _The Logic of International Restructuring_ (Routledge: 1995, p. 241) outlines this in a bit more detail: o 1930s: vast need for IBM's machines with governmental offices; 'lock-in' [lease] strategy kept IBM dominating public procurement market; o In 1940s and 1950s lead-user of first IBM mainframe 'computers': Pentagon and other governmental agencies; 1950s: Pentagon provided half of IBM's revenues; 1960: defence paid 35% of IBM's R&D budget; lease often implied cost-plus contract; o Cross-subsidies from military supplies enabled rapid internationalisation of civilian business; o 1968-1981: third antitrust suit against IBM terminated partly due to (trade) political considerations; o 1960s onwards: DARPA (defence) continued as a major source of funding for latest technologies and in support of IBM standards; This is from their Table 9A, which covers the Fortune 100 companies (1993), their "key strategic features", and "related trade barriers" (those of IBM are shown above). The table runs from pp. 239-268. Bill -- William S. Lear | Who is there that sees not that this inextricable labyrinth [EMAIL PROTECTED] | of reasons of state was artfully invented, lest the people quid faciendum? | should understand their own affairs, and, understanding, quaere verum | become inclined to conduct them? ---William Godwin, 1793
