Argentina's Nimble Giant

Doing business is not easy in Argentina, the crumpled cornucopia that in the past 16 months has gone through six economics ministers and five revolutionary crises. But some companies have managed to make millions despite all, and the leader of these is a nimble giant that sells Argentina the best that the rest of the world has to offer. It is SIAM Di Tella, Ltda., Latin America's biggest manufacturer, which produces an array of machines to cool, clean, feed and transport the Argentines. After the shabbiest year for Argentine business in a generation, SIAM'S 1962 sales are expected to be down substantially (to about $145 million), but the company will still show a profit of more than $3,000,000.

Like most major Latin American companies, SIAM (whose initials, in Spanish, stand for American Industrial Machinery Corp.) is not an innovator but an imitator. Under various license deals, it produces Westinghouse refrigerators and air conditioners, Hoover washing machines, British Motor Corp. Riley cars, Italian Lambretta scooters, Swedish Electrolux floor polishers and a multitude of other hard goods for Argentina, which boasts the broadest middle-class market in Latin America. Says Chairman Guy Clutterbuck, 55: "Conditions in Argentina make it difficult to carry out long and costly experimental programs. After all, Europe and the U.S. have much more technical know-how than we do."

Two Languages to Start. Clutterbuck grew into this tradition under the tutelage of the company's Italian-born founder, Torcuato Di Tella, who started half a century ago in a Buenos Aires garage as a producer of bakery machinery. Benevolently dictatorial Di Telia traveled far and saw even farther, signed license deals to manufacture U.S. iceboxes and, when cars came into vogue, U.S. gas pumps. Seeking a bilingual secretary to help with his U.S. and British contacts, he hired Clutterbuck, then 16, an orphaned son of British immigrants who never went beyond high school. Clutterbuck got his education in management science on the job, became chief after Di Telia died in 1948. He is now perhaps the most important private businessman south of Sao Paulo.

Besides hurdling some personal obstacles, Clutterbuck overcame many business handicaps peculiar to Latin America. Six years ago a discharged worker shot him in the face, leaving him with a twitchlike scar. Late in 1961, when many other Argentine businessmen were spending wildly in a euphoric inflation, Clutterbuck and a few top executives sensed political turmoil ahead and started retrenching. They gradually laid off 1,500 workers and cut back terms for installment-plan sales from two years to a year or less. All this deflated volume, but helped to preserve profits.

One Way to Go. Strong medicine has not cured all that ails SIAM. It must still import such simple parts as windshield wipers (paying 250% duty) because the local product is so shoddy. Last year a Peronist-oriented union, pushing for wage increases, led a slowdown that temporarily reduced automobile output from 36 cars to four cars a day. But retrenchment has left SIAM lithe and ready for fresh expansion. With the philosophy of a patriot who feels that Argentina has only one way to go, Clutterbuck says: "My country is at the bottom of the hill. Now we start to climb the other side."

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