'Financial Times': GE Close to Acquiring Honeywell?
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: GE is in the news this morning. Ian Rodger of the "Financial Times" joins us from London with some details. There has been a lot of talk about whether GE is going to get its Honeywell deal done. Now, what's the latest on this?</s>IAN RODGER, INTERNATIONAL NEWS EDITOR, "FINANCIAL TIMES": I can't imagine Jack Welch riding off into the sunset without having done this deal, and I think we had the impression in the last couple of days that the European Commission may have overstepped a bit, and I think they probably are doing a deal this morning.</s>ROMANS: So we know that there is some sort of meeting underway. What can you tell us, I guess, about what kind of hurdles there are and what Jack Welch might be trying to convince European regulators about?</s>RODGER: The big question is what concessions he's going to make. The commission has this bee in its bonnet about what they call bundling, that GE can use its financial leasing power to offer clients cheaper engines or the other way around. And they want to separate that, or at least have the accounts become transparent, so people can see what's going on. GE's made a couple of proposals on this. I expect they're going to come to agreement on it.</s>ROMANS: Yes, it's interesting. This is a pretty high-revenue part of Honeywell's business. How easily are they going to part with that? How badly do they want this deal to get done?</s>RODGER: I think the aircraft financing and leasing is, by far, the most important part. But you're quite right: One of the reasons for doing the Honeywell deal is to get the synergies out of the executive aircraft engine business and some of the other avionics components and so on. He'll give some there, I think, rather than give away the big money business, the leasing and financing.</s>ROMANS: Ian Rodger, this is definitely something we'll continue to watch with you. Thank you very much. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com