Brooke Sutherland, Columnist

GE Breakup Would Be True Radical Reset

The reasons for keeping the industrial giant together look increasingly tenuous.

January 16, 2018 at 5:59 PM UTC

Brooke Sutherland is Bloomberg News' Boston bureau chief and writes the Industrial Strength Newsletter. She was previously a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering deals and industrial companies and an M&A reporter for Bloomberg News.

1516129174_pic — Photographer: Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg

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This article is part of the January 22, 2018 issue of businessweek.

General Electric Co. is finally contemplating a more radical breakup, but it had to go through quite the journey to get to this point.

After announcing a $6.2 billion after-tax charge in relation to legacy insurance businesses on Tuesday -- the latest in a long-running series of ugly surprises -- CEO John Flannery again faced questions about the ultimate structure GE should take as a company. His response had a new wrinkle this time: Flannery reiterated previous platitudes about no sacred cows, but he also seemed to give credence to the idea of a split that would see some of GE's divisions, including its health care, aviation and power mainstays, becoming separately traded assets.