Description: Berkshire Hathaway, the $500 billion conglomerate that Warren Buffett built, is among the world's largest and most famous corporations. Yet, for all its power and celebrity, few people understand Berkshire, and many assume it cannot survive without Buffett. This book proves them wrong.
In a comprehensive portrait of the corporate culture that unites Berkshire's subsidiaries, Lawrence A. Cunningham unearths the traits that assure the conglomerate's continued prosperity. Riveting stories of each subsidiary's origins, triumphs, and journey to Berkshire reveal how managers generate economic value from intangibles like thrift, integrity, entrepreneurship, autonomy, and a sense of permanence. Rich with lessons for those wishing to profit from the Berkshire model, this engaging book is a valuable read for entrepreneurs, business owners, managers, family business members, and investors, and it is an important resource for scholars of corporate stewardship. General readers will enjoy learning how an iconoclastic businessman transformed a struggling textile company into a corporate legacy.Brief description: Lawrence A. Cunningham is the Henry St. George Tucker III Research Professor of Law at George Washington University. He is the author of many corporate governance and investing books, including Berkshire Beyond Buffett: The Enduring Value of Values (Columbia University Press, 2014).
Review Quotes: Berkshire Hathaway's trajectory has been so seamless that Warren Buffett's professional transition has gone almost unnoticed. The man who began his business life as a precocious 'stock picker' has morphed into the chief executive of one of the largest collections of businesses in the world. Lawrence A. Cunningham's book astutely chronicles this development.--From the foreword by Tom Murphy, Berkshire Hathaway director and former CEO of ABC, Inc.