Alcoa is the world's leading producer and manager of primary aluminum, fabricated aluminum and alumina facilities, and is active in all major aspects of the industry. Alcoa serves the aerospace, automotive, packaging, building and construction, commercial transportation and industrial markets, bringing design, engineering, production and other capabilities of Alcoa's businesses to customers.
Alcoa also markets consumer brands including Reynolds Wrap foils and plastic wraps, Alcoa wheels and Baco household wraps. Its other businesses include closures, fastening systems, precision castings and electrical distribution systems for cars and trucks. The company has 129,000 employees in 44 countries.

Type	Public (NYSE: AA)
Founded	Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, U.S. (1888)
Founder	Charles Martin Hall
Headquarters	New York, New York Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Alain J. P. Belda (Chairman) Klaus Kleinfeld (CEO), (President) & (Director)
Industry	Aluminum
Market cap	US$ 21.90 billion (2008)
Revenue	▲ US$ 30.748 billion (2007)
Operating income	▲ US$ 4.491 billion (2007)
Net income	▲ US$ 2.564 billion (2007)
Total assets	▲ US$ 38.803 billion (2007)
Total equity	▲ US$ 16.016 billion (2007)
Employees	107,000 (2008)
Subsidiaries	Reynolds Metals Halco Mining Kawneer Howmet Castings
Website	Alcoa.com

With Demand Up Sharply, Alcoa Posts 86% Profit Rise

A worker at an Alcoa plant in Boonville, Ind., inspected a roll of aluminum, which has become a hot commodity worldwide

Alcoa

"The Aluminum Company of America" -- became the firm's new name in 1907. The acronym "Alcoa" was coined in 1910, given as a name to two of the locales where major corporate facilities were located (although one of these has since been changed), and in 1999 was adopted as the official corporate name.

Under President Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Justice Department charged Alcoa with illegal monopolization, and demanded that the company be dissolved. Trial began on June 1, 1938.

Four years later, the trial judge dismissed the case. The government appealed.

Two more years passed, and in 1944, the Supreme Court announced that it couldn’t assemble a quorum to hear the case so it referred the matter to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

The following year, the year the world weary of war at last had a chance at peace, was also appropriately enough the year this litigation came to its end. Learned Hand wrote the opinion for the Second Circuit.

Hand wrote that he could consider only the percentage of the market in "virgin aluminum" for which Alcoa accounted. Alcoa had argued that it was in the position of having to compete with scrap. Even if the scrap was aluminum that Alcoa had manufactured in the first instance, it no longer controlled its marketing. But no, Hand defined the relevant market narrowly in accord with the prosecution's theory.

Alcoa said that if it was in fact deemed a monopoly, it acquired that position honestly, through outcompeting other companies through greater efficiencies. Hand applied a rule concerning practices that are illegal per se here, saying that it doesn’t matter how Alcoa became a monopoly, since its offense was simply to become one. Indeed, Hand seemed to be saying that in some circumstances inefficiency may be a requirement of the law.