conglomerate

con·glom·er·ate | \ kən-ˈgläm-rət

, -ˈglä-mə- \

Definition of conglomerate

(Entry 1 of 3)

: made up of parts from various sources or of various kinds the conglomerate peoples of New England a conglomerate empire

conglomerate

verb

con·glom·er·ate | \ kən-ˈglä-mə-ˌrāt

conglomerated; conglomerating

Definition of conglomerate (Entry 2 of 3)

intransitive verb

: to gather into a mass or coherent whole Infinite numbers of dull people conglomerated round her …— Virginia Woolf

transitive verb

: accumulate

conglomerate

noun

con·glom·er·ate | \ kən-ˈgläm-rət

, -ˈglä-mə- \

Definition of conglomerate (Entry 3 of 3)

1 : a composite mass or mixture especially : rock composed of rounded fragments varying from small pebbles to large boulders in a cement (as of hardened clay)

2 : a widely diversified corporation an international conglomerate of some 350 businesses

Other Words from conglomerate Synonyms & Antonyms More Example Sentences Learn More about conglomerate

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Examples of conglomerate in a Sentence

Verb people conglomerated in the downtown streets for an impromptu victory celebration over the years the town's discarded junk conglomerated at the bottom of the river Noun a news and entertainment conglomerate Our small company must compete with the big conglomerates.

Recent Examples on the Web: Adjective Gautam Adani, whose conglomerate sprawls from ports to coal mines to food, has seen his personal wealth more than double, to some $32bn. — The Economist, "Compounding inequality India’s super-rich are getting much richer," 5 Dec. 2020 That’s despite the fact that Trader Joe’s is owned by Aldi conglomerate Albrecht Discounts and parted ways long ago with its founder, Joe Coulombe, whom Lorr profiles at length. — Josephine Livingstone, The New Republic, "There’s No Such Thing as Ethical Grocery Shopping," 1 Oct. 2020 The state’s manufacturing companies had already spent the 1990s and early 2000s outsourcing their jobs, while the agriculture industry continued its transition to mega-conglomerate farming. — Nick Martin, The New Republic, "The Legend of Roy Cooper," 26 Oct. 2020 One of the latest and most beloved mega retailers to host a Deals Day of its own is Target, the hip big-box shop of its conglomerate neighbors. — Avery Felman, refinery29.com, "Look Out Amazon: Target’s Deals Day Just Dropped And It’s Primed For Savings," 13 Oct. 2020 The move deepened Bayer’s commitment to a conglomerate model -- combining crop science, pharmaceuticals and consumer health under one roof -- at a time when many rivals have rigorously sharpened their focuses. — Jef Feeley, Bloomberg.com, "Bayer Extends CEO’s Contract, Sees Progress on Roundup Deals," 10 Sep. 2020 Acquired by conglomerate Unilever in 1961, the company began to see increasing competition from Mister Softee and other rivals. — Colin Dickey, Smithsonian Magazine, "How the Ice Cream Truck Made Summer Cool," 10 July 2020 The lack of fact-checking in corporate publishing remains a scandal, but there are few signs that any conglomerate publisher plans on making the expensive decision to apply basic scrutiny to its books any time soon. — Alex Shephard, The New Republic, "Book Publishing’s Next Battle: Conservative Authors," 12 June 2020 The cement maker, a unit of conglomerate Salim Group, has shuttered majority of its 10 plants in Citeureup area as a result of the partial lockdown. — Tassia Sipahutar, Bloomberg.com, "Virus Shock Sparks Profit Warnings From Indonesian Firms," 2 June 2020 Recent Examples on the Web: Verb New disclosure filings show that the free masks came from the government of Taiwan and its diplomatic office in Chicago, a Chinese auto parts conglomerate, a major apparel company and the state’s largest health insurer. — USA TODAY, "Post-rally surge, PPE stocks, antibody study: News from around our 50 states," 11 July 2020 The pandemic seems to have accelerated the ambitions of chairman and managing director Mukesh Ambani, Asia's richest man, who wants to transition his RIL conglomerate away from oil toward digital industries. — Grady Mcgregor, Fortune, "11 deals for $15 billion in 10 weeks: Why India’s Jio Platforms is on an investment spree," 20 June 2020 When attempting to conglomerate all test results into a single geometric mean, Larabel found that the distribution's results were, on average, 14% faster than the slowest distributions tested (CentOS 8 and Ubuntu 18.04.3). — Jim Salter, Ars Technica, "Linux distro review: Intel’s own Clear Linux OS," 17 Feb. 2020 Computing giant International Business Machines Corp , consumer products conglomerate Procter & Gamble Co. and pharmaceutical maker Johnson & Johnson have all said that the dollar’s ascent hurt last quarter’s earnings. — Ira Iosebashvili, WSJ, "Strong Dollar Casts Shadow Over Stock Market Rally," 12 Feb. 2019 And then there is Secret, the women’s deodorant brand of the consumer goods conglomerate Procter & Gamble. — Kevin Draper, New York Times, "Pushed by Consumers, Some Sponsors Join Soccer’s Fight Over Equal Pay," 5 Aug. 2019 The French luxury goods conglomerate LVMH co-own the makeup brand with Rihanna, with Forbes estimating the company to be worth $3 billion, and that LVMH owns an estimated 50% of the brand while Rihanna owns about 15%. — Maeve Mcdermott, USA TODAY, "Rihanna tops Forbes' list of wealthiest female musicians with eye-popping $600 million," 13 Sep. 2018 The bride’s father is the vice president of investor relations and the treasurer of Textron, a global aerospace and defense technologies conglomerate in Providence, R.I. — New York Times, "Emily Salander, Felipe Maciá," 8 July 2018 For SoftBank, a deal would help the Japanese conglomerate put more money to work from its Vision Fund, which is backed largely by Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi sovereign-wealth funds, as well as money from SoftBank. — Eliot Brown, WSJ, "WeWork in Talks With SoftBank to Double Valuation to as Much as $40 Billion," 13 June 2018 Recent Examples on the Web: Noun And in the first week of December, the conglomerate illustrated how the river of corporate money flowing into AI in all those fields can come at the cost of lower standards for transparency and accountability. — Nicolás Rivero, Quartz, "Google showed us the danger of letting corporations lead AI research," 12 Dec. 2020 In mid-April, Minnesota hog farmer Greg Boerboom heard from a representative of Smithfield Foods that the meat conglomerate had to delay its weekly purchase of several semi loads of his animals due to illness at the company’s Sioux Falls plant. — USA Today, "How the South and Southwest became the global epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic," 10 Dec. 2020 The funds, raised by Diddy and his generous conglomerate, were set to specifically contribute towards Direct Relief's efforts to help those impacted by the novel coronavirus health crisis. — Darlene Aderoju, PEOPLE.com, "Diddy Provides COVID-19 Relief to More Than 175 Miami Families and Pays Their Rent amid Pandemic," 30 Dec. 2020 In addition, HNA Group, an airlines-and-hotel conglomerate, has had to pull back on aggressive acquisitions overseas and sell assets. — Lingling Wei, WSJ, "Jack Ma Makes Ant Offer to Placate Chinese Regulators," 20 Dec. 2020 The oil-to-telecom conglomerate is proof of Ambani’s belief. — Ananya Bhattacharya, Quartz India, "India’s richest man believes a crisis like Covid-19 is “too precious to be wasted”," 15 Dec. 2020 The wealth of Asia's top billionaire fell by about $6.5 billion on Monday after shares in his conglomerate plunged as much as 8.6%, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires index, which tracks the world's wealthiest people. — Michelle Toh, CNN, "Reliance CEO Mukesh Ambani loses billions as oil slump hits shares," 3 Nov. 2020 The Justice Department filed an antitrust lawsuit Tuesday alleging that Google engaged in anticompetitive conduct to preserve monopolies in search and search advertising that form the cornerstones of its vast conglomerate. — Andrew Stuttaford, National Review, "The Capital Note: Going After Google," 20 Oct. 2020 Founded in 1999, Alibaba is perhaps the most powerful conglomerate of all, with business lines spanning e-commerce sites, cloud-computing services, entertainment and logistics. — WSJ, "Alibaba, Ant Face Crackdowns From Chinese Regulators," 24 Dec. 2020

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'conglomerate.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

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Last Updated

13 Dec 2020

Cite this Entry

“Conglomerate.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/conglomerate. Accessed 17 Jan. 2021.

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More Definitions for conglomerate

conglomerate

noun

English Language Learners Definition of conglomerate

: a large business that is made of different kinds of companies

technical : a kind of rock that is made from many stones of different sizes held together with hardened clay

See the full definition for conglomerate in the English Language Learners Dictionary

conglomerate

noun

con·glom·er·ate | \ kən-ˈglä-mə-rət

Kids Definition of conglomerate

1 : a mass (as a rock) formed of fragments from various sources

2 : a corporation engaging in many different kinds of business

conglomerate

adjective

con·glom·er·ate | \ kən-ˈgläm-(ə-)rət

Medical Definition of conglomerate

(Entry 1 of 3)

: made up of parts from various sources or of various kinds

conglomerate

verb

con·glom·er·ate | \ -ə-ˌrāt

conglomerated; conglomerating

Medical Definition of conglomerate (Entry 2 of 3)

transitive verb

: to gather (something) into a mass or coherent whole

intransitive verb

: to gather into a mass or coherent whole

conglomerate

noun

con·glom·er·ate | \ -(ə-)rət

Medical Definition of conglomerate (Entry 3 of 3)

: a composite mass or mixture

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conglomerate

noun

con·glom·er·ate | \ kən-ˈglä-mə-rət

Legal Definition of conglomerate

: a widely diversified company especially : a corporation that acquires other companies whose activities are unrelated to the corporation's primary activity

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