GE Looking to the Future?

In an interesting read, MediaPost’s Diane Mermigas writes about GE creating a partnership with Mubadala Development Co and how it could impact a NBC Universal…

Facing its toughest uphill battle in decades, even blue-chip king General Electric has resorted to that strategy, creating an $8 billion global partnership with Abu Dhabi-based Mubadala Development Co., which is in the process of buying enough discounted GE shares on the open market to become one of the conglomerate’s top 10 institutional investors.

GE and Mubadala each will invest $4 billion in equity over three years to a new commercial finance venture. Mubadala will invest up to $200 million in GE Industrial Investment Partners, the new partnership of global investors providing capital to companies working in the transportation, health care and energy fields. GE will expand its successful green efforts with an additional $50 million for global investments in clean technologies and in companies that represent alternative energy sources. Regulatory approval is needed for the pact that must be hammered out of the “framework agreement” announced Tuesday.

The proposed deal is as brilliant as it is unsettling, and it could impact GE’s anticipated spinoff or monetization of its NBC Universal subsidiary. It is another stunning example of how the economic squeeze has increasingly driven some of the biggest U.S. companies to tap eager Middle Eastern, Asian and other foreign investors.