Mr John Mayo, former finance director of fallen corporate giant Marconi, has said the board of the telecoms equipment maker threw out a merger proposal worth £25 billion sterling two years ago.
The British group, now worth less than £1 billion after a turbulent year of profit warnings, severe job losses and management upheaval, made its "biggest mistake" by rejecting the nine pound per share offer in February 2000, Mr Mayo said in an interview in today's
Financial Times
.
Mr Mayo said one non-executive director on the Marconi board, voicing his opposition to the proposed merger, had invoked the British fighting spirit of the second world war when they were forced by the Germans to evacuate continental Europe in 1940.
"We didn't give up on the beaches of Dunkirk, and we are not going to give up now," the director said, according to the man ousted by the board last July amid the share price collapse.
Mr Mayo also said GEC, as Marconi used to be known, had not been compliant with the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which meant the company could not list in the United States and had to pay for US acquisitions in cash.
Marconi declined to comment on the story.