Horizontal integration. A diagram illustrating horizontal integration and contrasting it with vertical integration. Horizontal integration is the process of a company increasing production of goods or services at the same part of the supply chain. A company may do this via internal expansion, acquisition or merger. The process can lead to monopoly if a company captures the vast majority of the market for that product or service.
10 things invented by women. Clothes wringer/mangle. In 1880, an African-American woman named Ellen Elgin invented the clothes wringer. Sadly, she never made a fortune, selling her patent rights for a pittance because she believed if white women knew the wringer was invented by a black woman they wouldnât want it. Suspension bridge supports. Invented in 1811 by Sarah Guppy, 41, from Birmingham, UK. Windscreen Wipers.
Thomas L. Jennings (1791-1859) was the first African American person to receive a patent in the U.S., paving the way for future inventors of color to gain exclusive rights to their inventions. Born in 1791, Jennings lived and worked in New York City as a tailor and dry cleaner. He invented an early method of dry cleaning called dry scouring and patented it in 1821âfour years before Paris tailor Jean Baptiste Jolly refined his own chemical technique and established what many people claim was historyâs first dry cleaning business.