Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Glen Meakem


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. After sources were provided, the majority of editors opined keeping the article.  So Why  11:41, 12 July 2017 (UTC)

Glen Meakem

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Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Nothing is there. No other media coverage. some unknown non-notable, insignificant personality blatantly promoting himself and his company. Ridiculously violating standards of Wikipedia. Light2021 (talk) 21:30, 4 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of New York-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 21:50, 4 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Delete Glen Meakem on the Weekend red flags as brokered programming, where the subject paid for airtime on the radio, which we usually don't judge well (Basically the subject got thrown off WPGB when they converted to music because they were done with brokered weekend programming, thus the involuntary move to another station). Nominator has hit it well; reads like a WP:RESUME, and badly. No objection to Forever (website) being combined with this on grounds of being a clear WP:ADVERT.  Nate  • ( chatter ) 21:59, 4 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Delete -- not notable outside his company, and the company itself is only marginally notable, if at all. See Articles for deletion/Forever (website) (2nd nomination), which closed as no consensus. K.e.coffman (talk) 22:13, 4 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Businesspeople-related deletion discussions. K.e.coffman (talk) 22:18, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

Keep per the significant coverage in multiple independent reliable sources.  This article is a 3,840-word profile of Meakem. The article describes how his significant impact on industry: "In late 1994 a preppy, apple-cheeked MBA named Glen Meakem presented his proposal for a bold new business to his bosses at General Electric's headquarters in Fairfield, Conn. With a visionary's passion, Meakem told his audience, which included Gary Reiner, now GE's chief information officer and a favorite of CEO Jack Welch, that his venture would cost up to $10 million--but it might just change the world. His project would do no less than reinvent one of the murkiest, most backward, least sexy processes in industry: the purchase of the parts and materials that go into everything from granola to cars. ... GE makes few bad calls, but underestimating Meakem was one of them. Five years after Meakem made his presentation, FreeMarkets Inc., the Internet auction company he built for $50 million on the banks of Pittsburgh's rusty Monongahela River, boasts a market cap of $7 billion. Meakem himself is now one of America's new Internet megamillionaires (net worth: $750 million). ... More important, though, Meakem's breakthrough is beginning to have a seismic impact on industry in the 21st century. Call it the rise of the Auction Economy. General Motors, United Technologies, Raytheon, Quaker Oats--big, shrewd buyers that thought they were already getting rock-bottom prices--have saved more than 15%, on average, buying parts, materials, and even services at FreeMarkets auctions. Within a few years Emerson Electric may send one-fifth of its procurement budget (or $1 billion) through FreeMarkets, and Kent Brittan, vice president of supply management for United Technologies, waxes almost Meakemesque on the subject. 'This FreeMarkets auction idea,' says Brittan, 'is revolutionizing procurement as we know it.'" The article also provides significant biographical information about Meakem: "Meakem wears his squareness like a combat medal. While an undergraduate in the mid-1980s, he joined the ROTC; in his crew cut and starched uniform, he could not have stood out more in the liberal groves of Cambridge academe had he come to class in a grass skirt with a bone through his nose. By summer 1990, when Iraq invaded Kuwait, Meakem was at Harvard Business School, pursuing his MBA and serving an eight-year stint in the U.S. Army Reserve. ... Unable to bear missing the action, Meakem volunteered for service in the Gulf war, and in the middle of second-year exams, he was called up. Over the next six months, Lieutenant Meakem headed a platoon of dump trucks and soldiers that built airstrips, plowed roads, erected POW camps, and dug berms for Patriot missiles. In his spare time he started a PX, searching dusty Saudi towns for batteries or candy and literally sleeping with the cash box. The PX, in fact, earned a $7,000 profit, which Meakem returned to the Army."  The article notes: "The fight to lead business into the Digital Age is Glen T. Meakem's second war. While attending Harvard Business School in 1990, Meakem, a U.S. Army Reserve engineer, volunteered to fight against Saddam Hussein in the Persian Gulf. Meakem, today the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of online exchange FreeMarkets Inc. (FMKT), left in the middle of exams and served five months as the leader of a combat engineer platoon. ... The son of a corporate executive and a stay-at-home mom, Meakem grew up in Armonk, New York. Admirers say he's a big thinker who has always yearned to be a captain of industry. 'He conceptualized this company at a time when Netscape had barely been founded,' says Marlee S. Myers, a managing partner with Philadelphia law firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, which is FreeMarkets' outside counsel. After the Gulf War, Meakem returned to the career track. He finished his MBA and landed a job with McKinsey & Co. An associate, he worked with companies involved in industrial sourcing and commodities trading. Max Scoular, a general manager at FreeMarkets who met Meakem when the duo worked at McKinsey's Houston office, remembers one incident that illustrates Meakem's leadership skills. One December, Meakem had organized a golf outing for his McKinsey colleagues. Tee time was at 7 a.m. on Saturday. It was sleeting, so most of the players figured they could sleep in. But that morning, Meakem left his compadres a voice mail insisting they play. 'He got the whole field of 24 out there, and we had a tremendous time in the sleet and rain,' says Scoular. After McKinsey, Meakem moved to General Electric Co. (GE) for a chance to run a business."  The article notes: "Glenn Meakem has worn many hats throughout his career. He served as an officer in the United States Army, worked on the marketing team for the Jell-O gelatin and pudding division of Kraft Foods Inc., and provided consultation to an energy company. ... It was this experience that propelled Meakem to start FreeMarkets in 1995. The purpose of the company was to work with businesses to improve their purchasing functions. In 1999, FreeMarkets went public and in 2004, the company was sold. In 2005, Meakem founded Meakem Becker Venture Capital, a leading Pittsburgh based, early-stage venture capital firm."  The book notes: "CASE STUDY: FreeMarkets ... Glen Meakem was a pioneer in altering the business marketplace of manufacturers purchasing parts and supplies from supplying vendors with his new company, FreeMarkets. In 1993 Meakem first pitched his vision for a new kind of market to his then employer, General Electric: [quote from Shawn Tully of Fortune]  In his pitch, Meakem claimed that GE would save billions of dollars in its own manufacturing divisions. In addition, Meakem foresaw that GE could become a trading market facilitator for all American manufacturers, collecting billions more in transaction fees. Meakem got his idea, while working at General Electric. After graduating from Harvard Business School (and also having served in a reserve unit in the Gulf War) Meakem joined GE in 1994. At GE, he joined purchasing. [quote from Shawn Tully of Fortune] Meakem then had the idea that if GE held an auction like this electronically, GE could build a kind of commodity market for industrial supplies. In 1993, the Internet was still primarily a research tool. At that time, GE had a private electronic network for supply management, and Meakem proposed using it to try his electronic auction concept. His boss, Gary Reiner, told him to try it out at an experimental level. Meakem did this, holding his first GE auction on their private network, which resulted in a deal for circuit-boards from a new supplier in India that saved GE 45% less in cost of parts supply. Next Makem proposed to GE's headquarters in Fairfield, Connecticut, that GE should start a parts auction business. Meakem told his boss that the new venture would cost $10 million, but it would change the world. But at the time, GE's leadership worried about the cost and risk of the new business Meakem had proposed. His boss decided that Meakem should continue to experiment with his idea with the GE Information Services group. They thought the idea had promise but preferred to have Meakem try it out in GE Information Services. Meakem knew he was so right that he had to pursue his vision. He quit his job at GE and started his own business, FreeMarkets. It was an early success with a large market capitalization ($7 billion in 2000), and Meakem had become a multimilliionaire. ..."  The article notes: "Meakem became knowledgeable about electronic markets during a brief stint with General Electric, where he labored on a forebear of that organization's high-profile Trading Process Network, a Web-based sourcing system that was originally limited to GE suppliers. He developed his belief in the power of procurement at the consulting firm McKinsey & Co., his first stop after getting an M.B.A. from Harvard. (He graduated a year late, having skipped out on finals to lead a combat engineering platoon in the Persian Gulf War.) It was at McKinsey that Meakem met his cofounder, Sam Kinney. The two launched FreeMarkets Online in 1995 with $500,000 from their own savings and from family and friends. Angel investors put up the second half-million, and last year the company raised several million more through Saturn Asset Management, in Boston." <li> The article notes: "Glen Meakem is an unapologetic believer in capitalism and in Pittsburgh, in that order. So the company he founded is called Free Markets Online and its headquarters are Downtown. Meakem, who went to school in Boston and had never lived in Pittsburgh, relocated last year after co-founding Free Markets Online in 1995 with Sam Kinney. The pair met while they were working at McKinsey and Co. in the early 1990s. Kinney was posted in Pittsburgh, and when the pair decided to start their own company two years ago they figured Pittsburgh was as good a place as any for its headquarters. Cincinnati, Cleveland and Chicago were other possible sites."</li> <li> The article notes: "Pittsburgh-area radio talk show host Glen Meakem is hopeful for the country's future -- as soon as a more conservative-leaning government comes to power. Meakem, 47, of Edgeworth, spoke Wednesday at Penn State New Kensington about his views on the Constitution, improving the economy, problems with education and his disagreement with President Obama's policies. He spoke separately to Plum High School students, college students and a group of about two dozen community members. ... For the past 3 1/2 years Meakem has hosted a weekend morning radio program on WPGB FM New Talk 104.7. He also is a technology entrepreneur and venture capitalist, having founded the business-to-business Internet company Freemarkets Inc. and Meakem Becker Venture Capital."</li> <li> The article notes: "At age 42, fabulous wealth has not slaked his ambition as he plots his life's second act. He has staked out a dual path in Pennsylvania politics and venture capital investing in young Pittsburgh companies, while building an expansive new home in Sewickley in which to raise his five children. He believes he can make bigger money and yet a bigger difference by nurturing companies that will create jobs and by supporting candidates who will steer Pennsylvania away from what he believes are slothful tax and spend policies that stymie entrepreneurism and stunt economic growth. In July, former Lt. Gov. William Scranton introduced Meakem as the chairman of his campaign for the Republican nomination for next year's gubernatorial election bid to unseat Gov. Ed Rendell. While hurling full throttle into future, Meakem is a serious student of the past, who is winding down his service as chairman of the Sen. John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center."</li> <li> The article notes: "A native of Armonk, N.Y., Meakem holds a bachelor's degree in government from Harvard University and a master's in business administration from Harvard Business School. From 1987 to 1989 he worked for Kraft-General Foods Corp. in product marketing. As an officer in the U.S. Army Reserve, he served two tours of active duty including a stint as combat engineer platoon leader in Operation Desert Storm, a job he volunteered for, he told Business Week, because Saddam Hussein 'kind of pissed me off.' Acquaintances say Meakem came up with the fundamental idea for an Internet auction site when he was a manager in General Electric Corp.'s corporate business development group in 1994 and early 1995."</li> <li> The article notes: "Entrepreneur Glen Meakem is busy. The man who sold his Pittsburgh-based Freemarkets software company for $500 million is building a 30,000-square-foot home in Sewickley overlooking the Ohio River with a design, as he puts it, that 'is a little bit Monticello, a little bit New England.' But the home the 43-year-old Republican would really like to occupy overlooks the Susquehanna River in Harrisburg: the Governor's Mansion. Meakem says he probably will run someday, but not in 2010. In the meantime, the co-founder of Meakem Becker Venture Capital is raising money to invest in information technology start-ups. He's raised $70 million and pumped $8 million into three local companies. He also wants to spend time with his young family of three girls and two boys."</li> <li> The article notes: "Glen Meakem, the ex-Marine who founded and catapulted online services firm FreeMarkets Inc. to the top of Pittsburgh's dot.com heap during the late 1990s, has set his sights on another promising local venture, College Prowler Inc. Meakem has invested $500,000 in the publisher of college guides, which are designed to provide incoming students what they really want to know about campus life. He also will serve as chairman of the venture, co-founded by Carnegie Mellon University graduate student Luke Skurman. The former FreeMarkets chairman, whose firm was sold last summer to Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Ariba Inc. for about $300 million in cash and stock, agreed to make the investment and to sign on to the top executive post after a Duquesne Club lunch in July with Skurman."</li> <li> The article notes: "FreeMarkets co-founder and chief executive officer Glen Meakem is launching a new venture capital firm from the basement of his Sewickley home, repeating a pattern that began with his Internet auction firm, which began seven years ago in his old Connecticut cellar. ... This time around, the 38-year-old Meakem is using his considerable wealth from FreeMarkets Inc. to fund young, promising companies that have good management, a good business opportunity and a chance to make money. His firm, Chamberlain Investments, made its first outlay last week in South Side-based Akustica, an acoustic technology firm that makes tiny speakers and microphones for use in devices such as cell phones and hearing aids. Akustica's total round was $2.25 million, and Meakem was the lead investor. He put in more than $1 million of his own money."</li> </ol>There is sufficient coverage in reliable sources to allow Glen Meakem to pass Notability, which requires "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject". Cunard (talk) 00:38, 5 July 2017 (UTC) </ul>
 * Keep it short. You always make an AfD unnecessary so big, just Copy paste of ridiculous press is not arguments, it is just misleading, nothing else, as if you are trying to make a point, I seriously doubt you even read yourself what you copy-paste? have you gone through these media? Pitts berg is not even a source of Global media notability. Local newspaper you copy paste as if its a God of news. This is blatant promotions and highly misleading. Do you even read that ? or that how you make an arguments here, Keep it Simple Silly !! KISS logic. make it short, no need for COPY-PASTE the whole newspaper here. Do not able to see others opinions because you make the mess of whole AfD. Nothing significant is written here. Light2021 (talk) 04:35, 5 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Pinging Articles for deletion/Forever (website) (2nd nomination) participants who have not commented here:, , , , , , , and . Cunard (talk) 00:38, 5 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Delete because considering the currently cited sources in this article are not only promotionalism, but republisher ones, and with ones above equally mirroring such as "Unable to bear missing the action, Meakem volunteered for service", "designed to provide incoming students what they really want to know about campus life", "fabulous wealth has not slaked his ambition as he plots his life's second act. He has staked out a dual path in Pennsylvania politics and venture capital investing in young Pittsburgh companies, while building an expansive new home", "He believes he can make bigger money and yet a bigger difference by nurturing companies", "He developed his belief", "Meakem is a serious student of the past", "He is hopeful for", "He is raising money....He also wants to spend time with his young family of three girls and two boys", all would violate our policy WP:INDISCRIMINATE, sourcing. When it's a matter of repeated self-profiling and promo, it's certainly not that every publisher compliments him, instead their his own given words thus not independent coverage not anything like it. We never compromise with these regardless of scaled nunber because the facts are Crystal clear that they're thin press releases in and out. WP:NOT exemplifies our need to remove this and without questions on how, but simply the accomplish deletion alone together with the fact we're not and never will be a for-hire advertiser for anything or anyone.  SwisterTwister   talk  04:09, 5 July 2017 (UTC)
 * The subject has received extensive coverage in a case study in the John Wiley & Sons–published book Executive Strategy: Strategic Management and Information Technology. He has also received extensive profiles in the national sources Fortune and Bloomberg Businessweek, as well as sustained coverage in local sources Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. The John Wiley & Sons case study said "Glen Meakem was a pioneer in altering the business marketplace of manufacturers purchasing parts and supplies from supplying vendors with his new company, FreeMarkets."  Fortune said, "Meakem himself is now one of America's new Internet megamillionaires (net worth: $750 million). ... More important, though, Meakem's breakthrough is beginning to have a seismic impact on industry in the 21st century."  From Notability (people), "The person has made a widely recognized contribution that is part of the enduring historical record in his or her specific field."  He clearly passes Notability.  Cunard (talk) 04:30, 5 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Although that may sound significant at first, showing the full content shows: "Meakem knew he was so right that he had to pursue his vision" which is instantly promotional and seriously questions the independence of this, since that alone is indiscriminate, given there's no transparency whether this one promotional sentence or the entire piece was in fact influenced or supplied by him, it's therefore non-negotiably unacceptable by our policies. As with guidelines, WP:ANYBIO is only that, a suggestive notability guideline, whereas WP:Wikipedia is not a webhost or WP:Wikipedia is not for promotion, is policy used in these cases. Extensive, yes, but independent without his involvement? We can't say. SwisterTwister   talk  04:59, 5 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Keep There are two references that meet the criteria for establishing notability IMO. This book mentioned by Cunard above and other books such as this one are good references for establishing notability. The article itself needs a lot of trimming as there are claims made that can only be verified by primary sources (interviews or stuff he said on his radio show). For example, sentences like "He gave up the program to spend more time with his family and on another business he started, a cloud-storage host, Forever.com" and "He reportedly considered involving himself in a primary challenge to incumbent Republican Senator Arlen Specter in 2010". Also, sentences like "He sold the company for $500 million" is misleading - a company has a board not a single person making a decision. I'm happy to edit the article but concerns have been raised about editing articles in this manner during the AfD process - is this allowed or frowned upon? -- HighKing ++ 13:00, 5 July 2017 (UTC)
 * <small class="delsort-notice">Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 21:58, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
 * <small class="delsort-notice">Note: This debate has been included in the list of Radio-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 21:58, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
 * <small class="delsort-notice">Note: This debate has been included in the list of Pennsylvania-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 21:58, 11 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Keep. I often disagree with Cunard on articles like this, but his sources are to the point, and the present article is not particularly promotional.  DGG ( talk ) 06:25, 12 July 2017 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.