The Boston Globe from Boston, Massachusetts • 25

TliE BOSTO GLOIU; TliKSOAY. JULY 21). 10hu 25 I TODAY'S MEWS The energy in Cabot Corp Fare war over the Atlantic 30 Pru may lose pacts with US 30 Market stages late rally 31 Cabot wanted 'more horsepower at the They got it. 31 T-hill rates move higher TODAY'S EXTRAS Some perspective on "industrial policy "Industrial policy" and "reindus-trializatlon" are now the fashionable buzz words in economics in the United States. But while many in business welcome this new attention to their problems, there is another set of supporters of industrial policy out there with a different viewpoint.

Murray L. Weidenbaum provides some definitions in this week's The Economists column. it By Robert Lenznef Globe Staff Black Thunder turns on Robert Charple. president of Cabot probably the fastest growing industrial giant In Boston. Black Thunder is a coal mine 50 miles long and 20 miles wide in Campbell County, where Cabot Corp.

buys coal from ARCO and ships it on leased unit trains to a public utility In Amarillo. Texas. "It is the most exciting thing I've ever seen in the world. It is like the world's greatest waterfall. It has as much energy as Saudi Arabia has In its oil fields," said Charpie.

a tough, pragmatic. 54-year-old who turns emotional about this profitable niche in Cabot's valuable energy operations. The contract to provide coal for Southwestern Public Service Co. was an Interesting bonus in the 1979 acquisition of TUCO a Texas-based, gas processing and pipeline business that blended well with Cabot. Coal became an Immediate growth factor in Charpie's drive to make Cabot a "balanced energy and fuel-supplier business." The value of the coal contract rose 50 percent to $112 million a year recently when another of the utility's units went on stream.

And it will double in a few years to $225 million when the utility expands operations. Over a 30-year period this contract could be worth $6 billion to $10 billion to Cabot, depending upon the price of coal aix! the cost of transporting it. What's more, Charpie is anxious to begin negotiating with other utilities in the area that are interested in switching from natural gas to coal as their primary fuel. "We are learning a lot about coal without a large investment," said Charpie. "We would like to push further in this business." Energy has been a driving force in Charpie's-life from his days at the Oak Ridge Laboratories to his current efforts in the transformation of Cabot Corp.

from a $160-million, family-run maker of banal carbon black for the world's tire manufacturers Into a $1.5 billion company growing 40 percent a year. Ironically, Charpie. a Carnegie Tech-trained nuclear physicist now presides over an energy company that doesn't have any nuclear divisions. Cabot's energy group was good for $234.8 million of 1 979 total revenues of 1 1 billion. Operations are divided between gas exploration in West Virginia, gas pipelines and processing plants in several states, the Import of liquified natural gas (LNG) from Algeria, and participation in oil and gas drilling with the likes of Kerr-McGee, a major oil com- ing nuclear, mining, natural gas.

metal working, and environmental and pollution control. Cabot metals are In the hot end of every jet engine and every gas turbine engine, according to Charpie. Performance chemicals, a fancy name for the company's historical base In carbon black, were worth $387 million in 1979. about 30 percent of the company. Cabot has onequarter of the world's carbon black business, an ingredient essential for automobile and truck tires.

It makes money here while oil giants such as Shell and Ashland who also are In the carbon black business lose it. The need for more energy in Cabot was implicit in the decision 12 years ago by 58-year-old. art-collecting Louis W. Cabot, chairman of the board, to find fresh top management for his family company. "1 came to the conclusion we needed more horsepower at the top." said Cabot about the man who had risen through the managerial ranks at Union Carbide and than was picked off to become president of Bell Howell, the camera company, after Charles Percy went Into politics.

Horsepower indeed. The decision more than a decade ago has paid off for the Cabot family and Charpie. Cabot Corp. profits will be $108 million or about $10.50 a share for fiscal year 1980, up from $6.83 per share in 1979. Wall Street has pushed the stock close to $80 a share.

1 1 times what it sold for In 1975. The Cabot family, still holding 45 percent of the stock, now has a growing asset with a paper value of over $360 million. Third quarter ended June 30 earnings, announced yesterday, were a net of $27.15 million, or $2.60 a share, on total revenue of $391.4 million, compared with $19.9 million, or $1.92 a share, on $309.1 million in the same period a year ago. To Peter H. Vermilye.

a Cabot director and senior vice president of Citibank. Charpie has an abundance of natural resources. "He has an immensely powerful mind. He can grasp numbers, business problems, deal with scientific and technological concepts. He is incredibly ambitious, decisive and competitive.

He always wants to be No. 1," said Vermilye. Charpie is probably the highest-paid executive in Boston. He receives a salary of $597,750 and has accumulated contingent remuneration of another $2.5 million. He owns 107.000 shares of Cabot stock and has options to purchase another 58,000 shares.

This "golden handcuff," in the opinion of his friend, Cabot senior vice president William D. Manly, will prevent Charpie from taking an important government post, such as director of the Synfuels rumored in the press recently. CHARPIE, Page 28 27 What to expect in playing the options In this week's Market Lists column. Beatson Wallace explains the ins and outs, the "calls" and "puts" of the options markets. It is the fastest game around and is getting very popular, but should be played only by clients and brokers who understand the risks.

7 Afff jdm.n tnj Jt Mili I 28 Computers say it in pictures David Napior. manager of the Analytic Services Group of Abt Associates in Cambridge, has the company's computers doing a new trick. They can produce color maps cf any state or county and put in any information a user might want to distribute. Ronald Rosenberg explains the process in this week's Techno-Bytes column. 26 Robert Charpie GLOBE PHOTO BY PAUL CONNELl A recommendation for a retailer This week's survey of the advice from the Wall Street analysts turns up some good words for the operators of Lechmere Sales.

pany. Cabot the largest producer of natural gas and oil in West Virginia and Pennsylvania and was the first major Importer of Algerian LNG. The engineered products group provided $500.6 million, almost half of last year's revenues. It produces metal alloys used in many industries, includ 28 1UUSTRATION BY JEREMY ElKIN ew wave: ft 4 VI i 1 water sales The spring water business is bubbling. By Marcia Harrison Special to The Globe As the public reacts to increasing reports of contaminated water supplies, sales of bottled spring water are soaring.

Yet. the question remains as to the true benefit to be derived from spring health-wise, and most experts, feel the only benefit may be purely psychological. In Massachusetts, where the Dept. of Environmental Quality Engineering lists 23 towns with chemical contamination of some wells, sales of bot-, tied water via home delivery and in supermarkets are up 12-15 percent over last year. Stop Shop, Purity Supreme, and Star Markets now are selling bottled spring water in their beverage sections.

Star plans to sell its own label water starting in August at 89 cents for two gallons, "the cheapest water around," according to Jim Pignato, a buyer for the grocery chain. Nationally, the American Bottled Water Assn. reports sales Jumped from $175 million (233 million gallons) in 1975 to estimated sales of $264 million (352 million gallons) in 1980. The association's figures, however, are for all types of bottled waters: spring or well water, specially prepared drinking water (mineral content adjusted), distilled or purified used mainly in manufacturing, and fluoridated. The sales figures are not broken down by category.

The nation's oldest bottler of spring water, Poland Spring Corp. of Poland Spring, Maine, reports sales are up 225 percent over last year. "We attribute this to distribution gains, poor water supplies and increased public concern," company spokesman Michael Schott said. f. The company began bottling water in 1793 and first sold it to hospitals in wooden caskets.

Now. Poland Spring water is dis-i tributed "In 55 percent of the country and, with only 25 employees, last year's sales were In excess of $5 million," according to Schott. i "Like the yogurt Industry 10 years ago, it all points to health. Fifteen years ago, if you saw a construction worker eating yo Ron Brutoco of StarCase pay television, globe photo by joe runci Tube stakes in Boston A -c, i I ij J' By Susan Trausch Globe Staff Mr. Humble he's not.

Rinaldo "Call me Ron" Brutoco Is the first to tell you he's the top banana in the Boston pay television market and the last to admit he might slip. To competitors who say his Boston StarCase empire is about to tumble to a flashier product from Worcester, a new station in Providence, more aggressive marketing from Home Box Office (HBO), and the inevitability of cable television in Boston. Brutoco offers the numbers. He passes the numbers out in charts and draws thern on a pad as he talks. The numbers are not to be sneezed at: 35,000 subscribers have signed up for his Channel 68 over-the-air pay television service in the Boston area since January 1979 and that beats HBO, his chief competitor in the city, by about 30,000.

"What does that tell you?" Brutoco asks, not waiting for an answer. The Burlingame, native was In town recently to check up on his baby and said he knew his blue-gray. Wall Street, three-piece suit and matching silk tie were anything but Californian. "But it's TV." he added quickly. Brassy, fast-talking, the 33-year-old president of Universal Subscription Television, Star-Case's West Coast parent company.

Is part of the enterprising breed that has been carving out a new business in a big way PAY TELEVISION. Page 26 gurt, you think he was a twinkle toes. And we don't sell just to health-food freaks. For so many years people trusted and took for granted their water supplies. Water is a much larger national problem than any of us realized." Schott said.

Bottled spring water Is under the control of local boards of health that license bottling plants and Inspect their premises. In Massachusetts, water samples are taken by local boards on an annual basis and tested by independent laboratories. The state Dept. of Public Health (DPH) oversees all bottled water, imported and domestic. Over companies doing Interstate business the US mw SPRING WATER.

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