Having worked in a company acquired by the Loral empire I have a view of how things work in the acquired property. The huge, multi-billion dollar Loral company was run out of an office in New York that had, if I recall, about ten people in it. Loral made no effort to interfere in or run our business. They simply said, “send us x dollars every quarter.” How that was done was up to the people running the acquired company.
If Loral had attempted to meddle in the actual running of the company from that distant headquarters it most likely would have resulted in chaos. As an example, I once worked for Allied Stores, which was run from an office in Atlanta. Allied owned hundreds of stores all over the United States. They attempted to control them all from the central office. One of the things they did was decide when the stores would switch from winter to summer air-conditioning settings. These were literally controlled by a switch in the power room labeled, “Summer/Winter.” A memo would go out from Atlanta to switch from Summer to Winter and all stores would do it. I would arrive at my store in Tampa where the temperature was an astonishing ninety five degrees in the store. The store traffic would drop to almost zero. There was no way I was going to put up with working four hours in ninety five degrees so I’d go up to the power room and switch the switch back to turn on the air conditioning. It was obvious I’d done it, but nobody ever said anything. When the temperature was right in Tampa, I’d switch it back. One day I got a call from the head cashier. This was unusual and she was whispering. She had arranged to have me work somebody’s hours that night. I asked why and she whispered, “Just get in here and reset the dammed switch!”
Allied stores went out of business, and deservedly so. Every year, their location in Key West was stocked up in snow shovels and heavy winter clothes. Idiots...
Snow shovels are good for moving mulch in Florida. ;)