The executive suite of General Electric’s Connecticut headquarters was known as “carpet land”. Persian rugs and dense wool carpet covered every floor, creating an atmosphere of hushed probity. For almost a century, GE had stamped its curling blue logo on just about everything, from wind turbines to submarine detectors, fridges, televisions, toasters and lightbulbs. The office was a monument to the baronial power of its CEO. Jeff Immelt, the final chief to occupy this floor, enjoyed the use of a shoeshine station, a pantry and dining room. His two assistants also had their own private bathroom. When Immelt travelled by private jet, as he often did, a second, empty jet would often trail behind him in case of mechanical failures on the first plane.
At its peak, GE was an industrial empire worth almost $600bn. When Immelt became CEO in 2001, he inherited one of the most valuable companies in the world. It was so trustworthy that it had a triple-A credit score, the same rating given to government debt. Fast forward two decades and that huge company is about to disappear. In November 2021, General Electric announced it would be broken up into smaller fragments. Over the previous few years its number of employees had fallen by more than half. The founder of GE, Thomas Edison, was credited with inventing the lightbulb. By the 2000s, the company had started sourcing its lightbulbs from Chinese contractors and branding them as GE products. In 2020, GE sold off its lighting business for good.
