Michael Capellas, Playing Clean-Up Pays
Michael Capellas has made a career out of taking over sinking ships, applying a slick paint job, and then flipping them to someone willing to buy. A few months after doing that, he exits, whistling and with a few million dollars in his pocket. He sold Compaq to HP, and pocketed about $20 million. Then more recently he sold MCI to Verizon, and has now left the building with $39.2 million. (He’s done really well in playing clean-up.) (AT&T’s David Dorman made chump change in comparison, for actually selling a company that was finally turning the corner.) Now as one reader points out that given MC’s history, Verizon should be worried. Look what Compaq did to HP!
Since Bell Atlantic did a pretty good job gobbling up both NYNEX and GTE, there is no reason to expect them not to do the same as far as MCI is concerned. From the press releases, it looks looks like MCI will remain pretty much the same within a new business unit called ‘Verizon Business’.
A sinking ship with a slick paint job is still a sinking ship. Not sure about MCI, but HP learned this lesson with Compaq.