The Bombardier Story: Planes, Trains, and Snowmobiles: Amazon.ca: Larry MacDonald: Books

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Bombardier's first product, Skidoo, has become the generic name for snowmobile in the same way that Kleenex has come to mean facial tissues. Even if frolicking in the snow isn't compelling, Bombardier Inc. touches your life if you travel by plane or train, ride the subway, or play on the water. The Bombardier Story is a family saga starting in a garage in rural Quebec in 1937, where inventor-mechanic Jean-Armand Bombardier designed a snow vehicle to replace dog sleds for mail delivery, ambulance services, and taking children to school. By 1947 the family-run enterprise had sales of $2.3 million. But the winter of 1947-1948 was a rough one for the company. The usually white Quebec winter was virtually snow-free, while at the same time the government decreed that all provincial roads had to be cleared. The company's sales dropped by half. But that didn't stop Bombardier, and by 1959 he had converted his snowmobile into one of the most popular winter recreational vehicles of all time.

Bombardier died in 1964, and in 1966 his son-in-law, Laurent Beaudoin, became chief executive and built the company into the global transportation giant it is today, establishing his reputation as business superstar. Bombardier Inc. ranks first in the world in railway equipment, second in recreational machines, and number three after Boeing and Airbus in aircraft production. Evinrude and Johnson outboard motors and Learjet are among its best-known labels. The company employs 77,000 around the world, half of them working in the aerospace division and 37 per cent of them building railroads.

The Bombardier Story is a corporate history and a business case for how to flourish through diversification and acquisition. By buying troubled companies rather than successful businesses, and by establishing relationships with local governments wherever it was expanding, Bombardier became "one of the most remarkable cases of sustained growth in the corporate world." Author Larry MacDonald has a knack for explaining how powerful companies grow. His previous book, Nortel Networks: How Innovation and Vision Created a Network Giant , also shows how corporations behave as they face the ups and downs of international commerce. --Edward Trapunski --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Book Description

"Bombardier was under attach again. This time, the flack was coming from the president of Berlin-based Adtranz, the rail equipment subsidiary of DaimlerChrysler AG. In 1999, he traveled to Toronto and made a speech in which he warned that Adtranz was coming to challenge Montreal-based Bombardier on its home turf of North America. His motive was retaliation: he did not like Bombardier's invasion of Adtranz's European markets. So he was going to put the upstart from the hinterlands in its place. 'The major player in the United States of the future will be, I believe, Adtranz,' he predicted."

"In the spring of 2001, Bombardier acquired Adtranz. The purchase more than doubled annual revenues at Bombardier's rail equipment division and catapulted Bombardier into the number one spot in the railway equipment industry, ahead of the rail divisions of Franco-British conglomerate Alstom and German industrial giant Siemens."

"What made Bombardier's progression in rail equipment all the more remarkable is that it occurred while yet another progression was under way at Bombardier's aerospace group. In 1986, the company decided to enter the aerospace sector by acquiring business-jet maker Canadair Ltd. of Montreal. This was followed by acquisitions of several other ailing aerospace companies, including world-renowned Learjet. Turning around these floundering assets, Bombardier came out of nowhere to become, in a little more than a dozen years, the third-largest member of the civil aerospace manufacturing industry. Only US giant Boeing and European colossus, the Airbus consortium, are larger." — from The Bombardier Story

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First Sentence
The corporate logo of Bombardier shows a sprocket, a rather simple-looking wheel with several teeth around the circumference. Read the first page

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4.0 out of 5 stars Good, but not great, business history, Jun 4 2002

By

Robert Springall (Lewisburg, PA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Bombardier Story: Planes, Trains, and Snowmobiles (Hardcover)

Strengths of The Bombardier Story:
* Comprehensive, but non-controversial, chronology of company from J.A. Bombardier's Quebec garage to an international conglomerate
* Complete review of the company's entry into snowmobiles, trains, and aerospace
* Straight-forward analysis of strengths and weaknesses of the company looking forward to the market challenges of future years

Weaknesses:
* Even though the author writes early in the book that he will explain some of the company's innovative management methods, these parts come up short. The explanations of the Bombardier Management System and the employee-centric culture do not give the reader a lot of information that could easily transfer to their own businesses
* While I know little of the company's history beyond this book, I do believe that some of the less flattering portions of the company's history are played down or left out. This would include the company's investment in, then quiet exit from, the 100+-seat commercial jet business.

Recommended for those interested specifically in Bombardier's history or as a secondary reference for those interested in the business of recreational machines, trains, or civil aircraft.

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Amazon.com: 4.0 out of 5 stars (1 customer review)

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Good, but not great, business history, Jun 4 2002

By Robert Springall - Published on Amazon.com

This review is from: The Bombardier Story: Planes, Trains, and Snowmobiles (Hardcover)

Strengths of The Bombardier Story:
* Comprehensive, but non-controversial, chronology of company from J.A. Bombardier's Quebec garage to an international conglomerate
* Complete review of the company's entry into snowmobiles, trains, and aerospace
* Straight-forward analysis of strengths and weaknesses of the company looking forward to the market challenges of future years

Weaknesses:
* Even though the author writes early in the book that he will explain some of the company's innovative management methods, these parts come up short. The explanations of the Bombardier Management System and the employee-centric culture do not give the reader a lot of information that could easily transfer to their own businesses
* While I know little of the company's history beyond this book, I do believe that some of the less flattering portions of the company's history are played down or left out. This would include the company's investment in, then quiet exit from, the 100+-seat commercial jet business.

Recommended for those interested specifically in Bombardier's history or as a secondary reference for those interested in the business of recreational machines, trains, or civil aircraft.

› Go to Amazon.com to see the review 4.0 out of 5 stars

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The Bombardier Story: Planes, Trains, and Snowmobiles [Paperback]

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