Sunday, Apr. 20, 2003
It takes nerves of steel to run any firm these days, but Europe's metals and engineering stalwarts have special reason to be nervous. Industrial executives this month have been pummeled. In Germany,
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INDICATORS
A Bitter Pill To Swallow
German drugmaker Bayer and Britain's GlaxoSmithKline agreed to pay a combined $344 million in fines to settle charges that they overbilled U.S. government insurer Medicaid. Both companies were accused of repackaging drugs to hide the fact that they weren't charging Medicaid the lowest price, as required by law.
Lost The Signal
Grundig, once one of Germany's most prominent makers of TVs, VCRs and radios, filed for bankruptcy. The company, which used to employ 40,000 staff, said that merger talks with two other firms had fizzled.
Do Not Buy Such Filth!
The U.S. toy company Hero Builders began selling an action figure based on Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf, the missing Iraqi Information Minister. For $35.95, customers get a doll that shouts phrases like "There are no American infidels in Baghdad. Never!" |
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Kajo Neukirchen, head of the €8.5 billion engineering and chemicals group MG Technologies, has agreed to step down, even though his contract runs through 2006. With company stock in freefall, major shareholder Otto Happel forced him out. In the U.K., Brian Moffat announced he was stepping down as head of Corus Group, which was forged in 1999 out of British Steel and Dutch metals company Hoogovens. Unions and shareholders blamed Moffat's management style for a series of disasters, such as a botched spin-off of Corus' aluminum business. But the crisis may be cyclical; a survey of U.K. corporate performance after the 1974 bear market shows that engineering and manufacturing firms bounced back highest once the market turned around. So execs may have better days ahead — if they can steel themselves and hang onto their jobs in the meantime.
— By Steve Zwick
You're So Transparent
European firms are becoming more transparent and accountable to shareholders, according to executive search group Heidrick & Struggles. But there's a catch: "Not all of Europe is moving at the same speed," says INSEAD business school professor Philippe Haspeslagh. Southern Europe — Spain, Portugal, and Italy — still brings up the rear in H&S's ratings. And surprisingly, just above them is Germany, which last year passed a raft of corporate governance recommendations designed to instill shareholder trust. German boards, H&S charges, stifle openness and insulate against innovations from abroad. "Germany may be on the verge of major change," Haspeslagh says, "but its boards are still hampered by their large size, formalism and legal structure."
The Bottom Line
You just can't pay yourself that much, Richard. 
C. SAGE GIVENS, a director of HealthSouth Corp., now under U.S. investigation for fraud, to CEO Richard Scrushy, who since 1992 made $169 million in salary, bonuses and options
