In 1911, at the Justice Department’s request, the U.S. Supreme Court broke up John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil monopoly, which began in 1870. It was split into 33 companies, including Jersey Standard (Exxon), Socony (Mobil), and Socal (Chevron).
In 1945, a federal appeals court found that Alcoa had illegally maintained its monopoly over aluminum ingot production, which began in 1888. The company was not broken up, but the government strengthened competition by selling its own wartime plants to Kaiser and Reynolds.
On January 8, 1981, after 13 years of litigation, the Justice Department dropped its effort to break up IBM for allegedly monopolizing the computer industry.
Also on January 8, 1981, AT&T signed a consent decree with the Justice Department ending Ma-Bell’s century-long telephone monopoly. It agreed to divest its 22 local operating companies, which were then recognized as the seven Baby Bells.
In June 2000, a federal judge found that Microsoft had illegally maintained its monopoly on PC operating systems and ordered the company split in two. A year later, however, portions of the ruling were overturned, and Microsoft then settled, avoiding a breakup.
So, the lesson here is, do well, be successful, provide a good product that is needed and/or wanted by the people, and eventually you will get so big that some couldn’t-make-it-in-the-real-business-world failure who had to settle for a job in the Justice Department will either put you in your place by breaking up your company, or extort you for a bunch of money that will earn him a promotion.
It worked for Spitzer, didn’t it? It’s a good thing racketeering is illegal in this country...Hey, wait a minute...
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