Like "Law & Order," which mashes up a number of "ripped from the
headlines" crime events for an episode, members of the Ford family may push
for a sale of the family's stake in the automaker in the deal world's mashup
equivalent. The news first surfaced
last
week that some family members were in talks to hire Perella Weinberg
Partners LP. However, the family seems split
— sounds like shades of the Bancroft
family's schism
over
selling Dow Jones & Co. to News Corp. Indeed, there are some
similarities. A
Bloomberg story about the Ford family highlights a generational gap
between the younger members, who oppose family management of the company, and
the older generation, which supports familial control. In the case of the
Bancrofts, the family is split concerning the tradition of journalistic
independence at The Wall Street Journal — which some family members are
suspicious that Rupert Murdoch would not respect. Of course, it can't be a
mashup unless there are riffs crimped from another song. In the case of the
Fords, it just so happens that DaimlerChrysler AG finally
announced
the sale of a controlling stake in the Chrysler Group to buyout form
Cerberus.
—Matthew
Wurtzel
See story
from
Bloomberg
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