FMC Corporation

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FMC Corporation
Public
Traded as NYSE: FMC
Founded 1883; 141 years ago (1883)
Founder John Bean
Headquarters BNY Mellon Center
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (later FMC Tower, United States
Key people
 Pierre Brondeau (president and CEO)
Revenue
  • Increase US$ 3,874.8 million (2013) [1]
  • Increase US$ 3,409.9 million (2012) [1]
  • Increase US$ 659.0 million (2013) [1]
  • Increase US$ 639.1 million (2012) [1]
  • Decrease US$ 293.9 million (2013) [1]
  • Increase US$ 416.2 million (2012) [1]
Total assets
  • Increase US$ 5,235.2 million (2013) [2]
  • Increase US$ 4,373.9 million (2012) [1]
Total equity
  • Increase US$ 1,572.1 million (2013) [2]
  • Increase US$ 1,554.8 million (2012) [1]
Number of employees
 Approximately 5,500 (2012)[3]
Divisions FMC Agricultural Solutions
FMC Health and Nutrition
FMC Minerals
Website FMC.com

FMC Corporation is an American chemical manufacturing company headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The company was originally founded by chemist John Bean in 1883 as the Bean Spray Pump Company in Los Gatos, California, producing piston pumps for insecticides. In 1928, Bean Spray Pump purchased two companies: the Anderson-Barngrover Co. and Sprague-Sells Co. At this time the company changed its name to Food Machinery Corporation, and began using the initials FMC. In 1941 the company FMC received a contract to design and build amphibious landing vehicles tracked vehicles for the United States War Department,[4] and afterwards the company continued to diversify its products. FMC currently employs some 5,500 people worldwide, and had gross revenues of US$3.4 billion in 2011.[5]

History

The Bean Spray Pump Company

Founded in 1883 as the Bean Spray Pump Company in Los Gatos, California[6] by chemist John Bean. The company's first product was a piston pump. Bean invented the pump to spray insecticide on the many fruit orchards in the area. A Bean sprayer is on display at the Forbes Mill museum there.[7] Bean Avenue in downtown Los Gatos is named after John Bean.

FMC

In 1928, Bean Spray Pump purchased two companies: the Anderson-Barngrover Co. and Sprague-Sells Co. The Anderson-Barngrover Co. manufactured a sealed can rotary pressure sterilizer[8] and the Sprague-Sells Co. manufactured canning machinery. At this time the company changed its name to Food Machinery Corporation, and began using the initials FMC.

LVT-1 exhibited by manufacturer (FMC) in 1941 parade, Lakeland, FL.

FMC received a contract to design and build amphibious landing vehicles tracked vehicles for the United States War Department in 1941. FMC ranked 64th among United States corporations in the value of World War II military production contracts.[4]

In 1961, the U.S. Navy's Bureau of Ships issued bids for a high performance amphibious ship-to-shore cargo carrier capable of moving over water at 35 knots (approx. 40 mph) and over ground at the same speed. It had to carry five (5) tons of cargo across water, through the surf, across the beach, and inland. The vehicle also had to be quickly loaded and unloaded under combat conditions. FMC's Ordnance Division in San José, California built and tested two (2) prototypes named LVHX2 Landing Vehicle, Hydrofoil for the U.S. Marine Corps. These were the first amphibious landing vehicles to make use of hydrofoils for high speed ship-to-shore operation. Although the LVHX2 never went into production, the Marine Corps used the prototypes in their continuous research and development program to develop better equipment for amphibious assault operations.

FMC later built the M113 (APC) Armored Personnel Carrier and the Bradley Fighting Vehicle as well as the XR311 at its former facility in Santa Clara, California. It also purchased the rights to manufacture some foreign military hardware, including the Brazilian EE-9 Cascavel, under license.[9] The troubled development of the Bradley was satirized in the 1998 HBO movie The Pentagon Wars. In the movie FMC was fictionalized as A.O.C corporation. Bean also manufactured fire fighting equipment in the 1960s through the 1980s under the FMC and the Bean names.

FMC also produced fire truck fire pumps and pumper bodies, and had an OEM arrangement with LTI (Ladder Towers Inc.) to market aerial ladders. In the early 1980s the fire apparatus division of FMC tried to expand its role in aerial ladders on fire trucks, leveraging the Link-Belt crane division. FMC was ultimately unsuccessful in its expansion into production of aerial ladders. The FMC Fire Apparatus division was also ultimately shut down in 1990.[10]

FMC sells chemical products used by beef and poultry processors to reduce pathogens, such a E. coli and salmonella, on uncooked beef and poultry.[11] FMC obtained a patent on a method for sanitizing fowl that have been killed, plucked and eviscerated by contacting the fowl with an aqueous acid solution and maintaining that contact for a time sufficient to sanitize the fowl.[11]

Spinoffs

FMC plant in South Charleston, West Virginia, 1970
FMC 210 Skidder made by FMC

In 1946, FMC bought out Bolens Lawn And Garden Equipment. FMC changed names again in 1948, becoming Food Machinery and Chemical Corporation. In 1961 the name was changed to FMC Corporation.

In 1967, the FMC Corporation merged with the Link-Belt Company. The company produced FMC Link-Belt branded cranes and excavators. In 1986, the Link-Belt Construction Equipment Company was formed as a joint venture between FMC Corporation and Sumitomo Heavy Industries.

Between 1965 and 1985 FMC was the owner of the Gunderson metal works in Oregon USA, during that period it was known as the 'Marine and Rail Equipment Division of FMC' (MRED), it was sold in 1985 to The Greenbrier Companies.[12]

In the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s (decade), FMC Corporation began spinning several of its divisions into separate companies, including United Defense and FMC Technologies, and selling its divisions, including the John Bean Company, now a subsidiary of Snap-on Equipment, a division of Snap-on. Bolens was sold to Troy-Built in 1988.[13]

Recently

Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. In 2001, FMC spun off its energy, airport, and food equipment businesses into a separate company named FMC Technologies, Inc.

In 2006 FMC Corporation celebrated 75 years being listed on the New York Stock Exchange.

Pierre Brondeau has been named President and Chief Executive Officer succeeding William G. Walter, effective January 1, 2010. Mr. Brondeau was formerly with Dow Chemical and prior to that Rohm & Haas.[14]

A former FMC site in San Jose, California is the location for Avaya Stadium, a new soccer-specific stadium for the San Jose Earthquakes.

Issues

African lion program

In 2009, CBS television news magazine 60 Minutes ran an exposé discussing the use of an FMC Corporation–produced pesticide, Furadan, as a poison used by Kenyan farmers to kill African lions. The piece suggested that Furadan was a serious threat to the future of the lion population in Africa.[15] FMC has commented extensively on this issue through the media and their websites including furadanfacts.com. They actively engaged with government officials, NGOs and others to try and resolve the illegal use of pesticides to kill wildlife. The company took action to stop the sale of this product and instituted a buy-back program in East Africa when it was determined that the illegal and intentional misuse of chemicals against wildlife could not be controlled by education or stewardship programs alone. [16] [17]

Gallery

  • Plant behind a street in 1973

  • Chaires Engine 12-61 GMC FMC

  • 1991 Ford FMC, New Market Community Volunteer Fire Department & SW Rescue

Further reading

  • Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  • Kathy Hinson (ed.), Gunderson; A history of an Oregon Company (Portland, OR: Gunderson, 2000).

See also

American Viscose Corporation

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Peck, Merton J. & Scherer, Frederic M. The Weapons Acquisition Process: An Economic Analysis (1962) Harvard Business School p.619
  5. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  6. ↑ http://www.losgatosca.gov/documents/Community%20Development/Planning/Historic%20Preservation/almondgrove.PDF Los Gatos city ordinance honoring the history of the Almond Grove neighborhood
  7. ↑ http://www.museumsoflosgatos.org/History.html Forbes Mill museum (see photo of Bean sprayer)
  8. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  9. ↑ Latin American Research Review Volume 26, Number 3, Pages 83
  10. ↑ Aerial Fire Trucks, By Larry Shapiro, page 61.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 http://www.cafc.uscourts.gov/opinions/08-1228.pdf
  12. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  13. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  14. ↑ http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=117919&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1352343&highlight=
  15. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  16. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  17. ↑ http://www.furadanfacts.com/

External links

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