[Animats]

The classic book on this is "Electrical Manufacturers 1875-1900".[1] Published by the Harvard Business School, it has Edison's business plan for the Pearl Street station. As I recall, the plan claimed the investment would be paid back in 18 months. It took twice that long.

It was very much a startup. Then came consolidation and mergers, resulting in General Electric.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Electrical-Manufactures-1875-1900-Com...

[Gunnerhead]

Link didn't work, would love to get that book.

[Animats]

Better URL. [1]

It's in the Stanford libraries, or at least was when I read it years ago.

Also useful is "Men and Volts", an official history of General Electric.[2]

From an investment perspective, it's worth reading the early history of the electrical industry, because it's very much like the history of the computer industry. Just a century earlier. You get to see something go from cutting edge technology with high margins to dull and boring with low margins, over half a century. You get to see the transition from thousands of little companies to a few big ones.

As you keep going into the radio era, you see the transition from paid services to ad-supported ones. It will all look very familiar.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Electrical-Manufacturers-1875-1900-St...

[2] https://www.amazon.com/Men-volts-story-General-electric/dp/B...

[mdp2021]

There you are, available in the Library:

https://archive.org/details/electricalmanufa0000unse

Do not forget about the library in Archive.org ...