[AT] While we are OT on Refrigerators. Now really OT - Hyundai

[Mark Johnson]

Many years ago ( although it doesn't seem like it, it was the early 
1990s) the company I worked for was acquired by Hyundai.

In many ways, those were the best years of my professional career:

- The owners left the US management in place. Even as a wholly owned 
subsidiary, we ran our own show. The 'big boss' only ever visited our 
plant in Wichita once, and he was impressed by what he saw.
- Engineering salaries were more than competitive, especially for a 
company in Kansas!
- The corporate attitude was 'if our products are substandard, we will 
improve them so we can dominate the market, or we will get out.'
- The best of Korean management philosophies were brought in, not the 
stuff that didn't work in the West.
- Profit sharing extended to everyone, not just the senior management. 
It went all the way down to the engineers, assemblers on the line and 
the facilities maintenance crew. The compensation formula for everyone 
below 'senior director' level was exactly the same.
- Since the company was effectively privately held (the Chung family 
held tight control over Hyundai, which owned 100% of us) there was no BS 
with financial reporting, insider trading, or news blackout periods.

The only reason the company left the Hyundai corporate family was the 
Asian financial crisis of the 1990s. Our company (we built data storage 
systems) was a solid, saleable asset with a good quality reputation, 
purchased by a US company fairly quickly. Chairman Chung needed cash!

The downside of the 1990-2000 period for us was a time when we should 
have had a color LED sign on the building with the corporate name 
(something I actually suggested to the general manager; he got a good 
chuckle out of it). With selloff, acquisition, another selloff, and a 
renaming we changed the logo on the front wall 5 times in about 9 years.

Mark J

On 6/6/2020 10:51 AM, cgs wrote:
> Hyundais are not so bad. They can last for 100,000 miles...almost as 
> long as a good tractor!
>
> On 6/6/20 10:26 AM, Cecil Bearden wrote:
>> Remember back when gas was over $4/gallon.  You could fill up a 
>> Hyundai and double the value...
>> Cecil 
>
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