Video Analysis From Hoover's Editors
Computer Software
NetSuite Inc.
This software company made the best of a soft market when it brought forth its IPO just before Christmas. NetSuite offers online customer relationship management (CRM) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) software; its products are aimed at small and medium-sized businesses, and designed to help them manage various processes including sales cycles, order management, and billing. The company has excellent connections in its industry, since Oracle honcho Larry Ellison controls 55% of it.
Leisure
NFL
In the world of American sports, the NFL reigns supreme. But while the league is used to dominating television ratings and generally operating unopposed in its quest to print money, it has run aground of a couple of large and stubborn foes, namely the giant cable television providers Comcast and Time Warner. The crux of the struggle is the NFL Network, which the league uses to pump football to fans 24/7/365 -- but which the big cable providers have declined to include in their broadcasting lineup. It was the league that blinked late in December, when the NFL decided that CBS and NBC could simulcast the NFL Network airing of the regular-season finale between the New York Giants and the New England Patriots (a game that the Patriots won to cement a perfect 16-0 record).
Construction
Trane & Ingersoll-Rand
Apparently, Ingersoll-Rand believes the old slogan that "It's Hard To Stop a Trane." At least you'd think so, since it has agreed to pay $10 billion to buy Trane. Since Ingersoll-Rand already has a big HVAC and refrigeration business of its own, including the Thermo-King and Hussmann brands, the deal should make the combined outfit one of the world's top suppliers of HVAC equipment. Neither company is a stranger to restructuring: both Ingersoll-Rand and Trane have undergone significant reshaping in recent years as they've tried to find ideal mixes of product lines.
Consumer Products Manufacturers
Reckitt Benckiser
Reckitt Benckiser (rhymes with "freezer") may not be a household name, but its products certainly are. Its lineup includes stalwarts of the kitchen and laundry room like Electrasol, Easy-Off, Lysol, and Woolite. Now the company plans to add the cold remedy Mucinex to the mix by acquiring the medicine's maker, Adams Respiratory Therapeutics. Even though Adams brought in just $330 million in its last fiscal year, Reckitt has put up more than $2 billion to buy the company. Adams' Mucinex and Delsym cough and cold remedies will join other Reckitt medicine brands like Clearasil, Nurofen, and Strepsils.