Keiei Shigaku (Japan Business History Review)

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The Royton group was widely known as one of the best-performing company groups among the Oldham limiteds in the interwar period. The purpose of this article is to clarify the origin and process of the group from its formative years, and to analyze its major strategies. Analysis is based on the company records stocked at Shiloh Spinners Ltd., company files in the Public Record Office and Company Registration Office of London, and the Oldham local newspapers. The major conclusions are the following.
(1) The group originated in the Royton and Star Spinning Company which was founded in the midst of the phenomenal 1873-75 boom in the flotation of cotton spinning companies. M.B. Tattersall was a principal entrepreneur in forming the group.
(2) G.E. Gartside, a “student” of the M.B. Tattersall school, spun off from the Tattersall group by establishing the Holly Mills in 1890. He was, however, closely aligned with Tattersall's group, so that it is reasonable to regard the companies as part of a single group.
(3) The group's strategies were not notably different from those of most well-performing cotton spinning companies, but among the Oldham limiteds they were not common, and therefore worthy of appreciation.
(4) How was it possible to keep up the good performance among the group?, One of the answers is found in the internal labour market of the group. Mill officials were usually recruited and moved within the group, so management strategies could be settled in each company.

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Standard Oil Company (New Jersey) -the present name is Exxon Corporation-has been the biggest company in the world petroleum industry since the late 19th century. The purpose of this paper is to clarify the characteristics of business activities of the Company during World War II.
The main characteristics were as follows :
(1) The Company maintained and shored up the fundamental structure of operations which had been established during the 1920s and 1930s : the crude oil production department played a most important part in dominating other companies; the cartel continued to be effective in crude oil production, especially in the U.S.A.; the range of operations was worldwide in wartime as well as before the war.
(2) The Company manufactured strategic munitions, that is, aviation gasoline (100-octane), butadiene and synthetic toluene. I think this was an important beginning for petroleum chemical operations by the Company. But it was small in scale in contrast to other operations. I estimate that it didn't provide profits of any importance.
(3) The Company made use of government finances, which were essential. But it used them chiefly for operations which had little validity in peacetime. The main operations, for instance, crude oil production, were carried out using the company's own capital.

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