Dutch Treat

Fokker's challenge to Boeing

When it comes to flying high, few businessmen can measure up to Frans Swarttouw, 49, of The Netherlands. Having built Rotterdam's containership terminal into a key operation of the world's biggest and busiest deepwater port, Swarttouw took command three years ago of Holland's weak and floundering Fokker aircraft company and promptly set about developing a strategy to propel it into the front ranks of the world's airframe manufacturers.

Last week in Amsterdam, Swarttouw announced that Fokker (1980 sales: $450 million) and McDonnell Douglas Corp. of St. Louis (1980 sales:...

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