On March 14, 2007, Standard&Poor's Rating Services lowered its long-term corporate credit rating on France-based Schneider Electric S.A.--a major world player in electrical distribution, industrial control, and automation--to 'BBB+' from 'A'. At the same time, the short-term corporate credit rating was lowered to 'A-2' from 'A-1', in line with Standard&Poor's policy on the correlation between long- and short-term ratings. The outlook is stable. All ratings were removed from CreditWatch, where they had been placed with negative implications on Oct. 30, 2006, following Schneider's bid for 100% of American Power Conversion (APC). The downgrade reflects Schneider's financial structure after the acquisition of APC. Standard&Poor's considers that this acquisition is coherent with the group's strategy of
