Sweet Spot Petra has gobbled up market share in Southeast Asia, leaving its European and U.S. competitors in a cloud of cocoa dust. 2005 market share (dollar value) Source: Euromonitor International.

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Mattei shook up the business by offering oil-exporting nations a bigger share of production. (He also reportedly tried to win a sweet deal by enticing the Shah of Iran with an Italian princess.) At one point British diplomats fretted that Mattei's dealmaking could "seriously prejudice the stability of the Middle East, " according to The Prize, Daniel Yergin's 1991 history of the oil business.

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