As consumer demand for local, organic and fresh foods continues to grow, the enormous multinational firms that are collectively being called Big Food are in the position of having to rework, reshape and reimagine themselves.
Goldman Sachs and Citigroup said their major offices in Lower Manhattan — which house the firms' enormous trading floors — would be closed to all but essential personnel.
Some librarians worry that this gives the internet firm enormous power.
Last spring, Google bested Microsoft, Yahoo, and the enormous advertising-marketing firm WPP to buy DoubleClick, the online advertising and marketing company.
YouTube's audience is enormous; the measurement firm comScore reported that 100 million viewers in the United States visited the site in October.
Thanks to its first-mover advantage and enormous scale, the firm is also well positioned to benefit from the rise of the country's middle classes.But that does not mean Alibaba is a good share at any price.
Failing a higher bid at auction, Monitor will be bought by Deloitte, an enormous professional-services firm, for just $116m, a figure subject to future reductions as Monitor sorts out its finances.
"The ramifications of losing those exemptions are enormous to these firms," David S. Ruder, a former S.E.C. chairman, said in an interview.
The president of the CBI, Paul Drechsler, said it was "an enormous relief to firms in every corner of the country".
Paul Drechsler, president of the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), said the decision to expand was "an enormous relief to firms in every corner of the country".
