ABSTRACT
This chapter uses the longitudinal approach and analyses both common traits and differences in the development of two large corporations: Atlas Copco AB of Sweden; and Ingersoll-Rand Corporation of the USA. It appears natural to investigate companies that are, in one way or other, comparable, for example, in that they belong to the same industry and hence, implicitly, compete with each other. When the two companies started internationalising, they sometimes joined forces and had a common representative or sales office abroad. Thus competition is an integral part of our investigation and competitors, facing a roughly similar environment and having been successful to the extent of surviving, share important common traits. The profitability measure used relates the total compensation paid to capital, including taxes and appropriations plus depreciation, to this very capital. The Ingersoll-Rand story repeats many of the traits, although they are flavoured by the larger spatial scale of the American continent and the policy of diversification by acquisition.
