Nearly half of the Williams board (6 of 14 board members) were part of a cabal that tried to force the company to sell itself to Energy Transfer Equity–a deal that went horribly wrong. Following the aborted merger, six of Williams’ board members tried to engineer a palace coup to depose current CEO Alan Armstrong. The coup failed and the board members were either forced out, or resigned in disgust (we’re not sure). Either way, it’s good news for Williams and their operations in the northeast. Among the board members pushing for a sale to ETE (and pushing for the ouster of Armstrong) was Keith Meister, a disciple and student of evil corporate raider Carl Icahn (see Bad News: Corporate Raiders Take Aim at Williams). Another corporate raider who was dug in like a chigger, Eric Mandelblatt, was also pushing to replace Armstrong (see Evil Corporate Raiders Double Investment (& Control) in Williams). On Friday Williams announced the chairman of the board, Frank MacInnis, is stepping down for “personal reasons” and that another five board members are leaving with him. Among those leaving are corporate raiders Meister and Mandelblatt. Good riddance…
Nearly half of the Williams board (6 of 14 board members) were part of a cabal that tried to force the company to sell itself to Energy Transfer Equity–a deal that went horribly wrong. Following the aborted merger, six of Williams’ board members tried to engineer a palace coup to depose current CEO Alan Armstrong. The coup failed and the board members were either forced out, or resigned in disgust (we’re not sure). Either way, it’s good news for Williams and their operations in the northeast. Among the board members pushing for a sale to ETE (and pushing for the ouster of Armstrong) was Keith Meister, a disciple and student of evil corporate raider Carl Icahn (see 