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Certainly. There are also many that no longer exist.

From a summary I wrote of "Why Most Things Fail":

Of the 100 largest industrial companies in 1912, by 1995, 29 had gone bankrupt, 48 disappeared (mergers, acquisitions and so on), and 52 survived, but only 19 remained in the top 100. Once you discount the large number of small companies that fail in their first few years, the average lifespan for small companies is similar to that of large firms - and most of them eventually fail.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000XUBDQM/?tag=dedasys-20 - although I don't know if I'd recommend buying it. It's good, but never seemed to gel 100% for me.



Okay, that makes sense then. I can see how 25 years can be the expected lifespan of a public company.

However, of those 48 companies that disappeared. Aren't those essentially liquidity events resulting in a lot of money for the shareholders?


> However, of those 48 companies that disappeared. Aren't those essentially liquidity events resulting in a lot of money for the shareholders?

Some were probably good, others bad for the shareholders.




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