not by me but people that I used to work with.

I was reading through some trade publications today at work and I noticed an article about my former employer (the actual employer owns a majority of the company that I actually worked for).  The former employer has gone out and partnered with another company to do something that I damn well know could have been put together in house.  Now I don’t work for them anymore so this doesn’t really bother me, but it got me to thinking about this company.

From the time I started working there to the time that I left the parent company had invested millions of dollars in other companies.  Millions.  Most of the stuff that they bought elsewhere could have been produced by the child company (that I worked for).  But no.  They went and bought outside stuff.  Granted some of the stuff that they bought would have taken awhile to develop, but I know it could have been done and done for less cost.  In the end some of those products they bought for millions of dollars failed miserably and the company I ended up working for took it over (so wasted millions of dollars…I won’t get onto their pay practices!).

As I read the article I thought about this companies recent stock price (yes they are a publicly traded company) and how it has tanked the last 9 to 12 months. Would having their projects moved in house have helped the stock price?  Probably not, but I’d like to think that taking some of those millions and putting them into a company that you already own…well it’s like your not losing the money.

Any how just some random thoughts.