Rescue the Customer, Own the Industry

"Michelin puts around sixty million francs on the table. With the shares he receives from André Citroën and the shares of many small shareholders he buys back, he soon holds fifty-three percent of the capital. Long-term arrangements are made with other major creditors."

"At Quai de Javel, the new owner makes sharp cuts. Six thousand layoffs—five thousand workers and one thousand white-collar workers—are decided by Pierre Michelin. No more family scions (those called “hickeys”), no more secretaries overly concerned with their elegance, no more workers whimsical about their schedules, no more expenses that aren’t absolutely necessary, no more adventurous epics, no more fanfare. André Citroën’s closest collaborators are thanked and let go. The parent company in Clermont-Ferrand continues to send—often in “submarines”—some of its trusted men to reorganize the business from top to bottom, take back control of the staff, and identify overly disruptive unionists."

"WITHOUT the green light given at the end of 1935 by the patriarch of Clermont, the Bull Machine Company would have died a natural death, four years after its birth. And French computing would have had to take other paths to begin its launch. In the autumn of 1935, the main shareholders of the Bull Company, specialized in the production of punched card accounting machines, are worried. At Avenue Gambetta, at the headquarters, the directors meet in a conclave to decide whether, failing to reach a balance in their accounts within a reasonable time frame, they should ask the State for help or simply sell the business to IBM. A minimum of six million francs is needed to bail it out."

"In December, Citroën is absorbed purely and simply. And Michelin becomes a shareholder with about ten percent of the Peugeot-Citroën group. François Rollier and Jean-Claude Tournand return to Clermont-Ferrand. This time, definitively, François Michelin cuts ties. The manufacturer no longer carries the automotive burden while remaining Citroën’s exclusive supplier. And for Peugeot, a majority supplier (about sixty percent of its supplies). Michelin can finally concentrate its efforts on what it knows and what it is made for: tires[41](private://read/01jkqdqdgs7t399cyecbezrhj0/#ftn_fn41)."