conglomerate
Americannoun
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conglomerates
plural
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anything composed of heterogeneous materials or elements.
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a corporation consisting of a number of subsidiary companies or divisions in a variety of unrelated industries, usually as a result of merger or acquisition.
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Geology. a rock consisting of pebbles or the like embedded in a finer cementing material; consolidated gravel.
adjective
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gathered into a rounded mass; consisting of parts so gathered; clustered.
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consisting of heterogeneous parts or elements.
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of or relating to a corporate conglomerate.
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Geology. of the nature of a conglomerate.
verb (used with object)
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conglomerates,
present (3rd person singular)
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conglomerated,
past participle, past
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conglomerating
present participle
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to bring together into a cohering mass.
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to gather into a ball or rounded mass.
verb (used without object)
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conglomerates,
present (3rd person singular)
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conglomerated,
past participle, past
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conglomerating
present participle
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to collect or cluster together.
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(of a company) to become part of or merge with a conglomerate.
noun
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a thing composed of heterogeneous elements; mass
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any coarse-grained sedimentary rock consisting of rounded fragments of rock embedded in a finer matrix Compare agglomerate
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a large corporation consisting of a group of companies dealing in widely diversified goods, services, etc
verb
adjective
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made up of heterogeneous elements; massed
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(of sedimentary rocks) consisting of rounded fragments within a finer matrix
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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miniconglomeratenoun
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superconglomeratenoun
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deconglomerateverb
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conglomeraticadjective
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conglomeriticadjective
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pseudoconglomerateadjective
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unconglomeratedadjective
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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conglomeratesimple
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conglomeratessimple
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have conglomeratedperfect
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has conglomeratedperfect
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am conglomeratingprogressive
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are conglomeratingprogressive
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is conglomeratingprogressive
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have been conglomeratingperfect progressive
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has been conglomeratingperfect progressive
Past
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conglomeratedsimple
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had conglomeratedperfect
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was conglomeratingprogressive
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were conglomeratingprogressive
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had been conglomeratingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of conglomerate
1565–75; < Latin conglomerātus (past participle of conglomerāre ), equivalent to con- con- + glomer- (stem of glomus ) ball of yarn + -ātus -ate 1
Explanation
A conglomerate is a group of things, especially companies, put together to form one. If you are rich enough to buy a TV network, a record company, several newspapers, and a radio station, you too can own a media conglomerate. The root of conglomerate is glomus, a Latin word for “ball.” So think of a conglomerate as a bunch of different things balled together. Before it came to describe giant corporations, a conglomerate was a rock formed from different kinds of minerals. Conglomerate can also be used as a verb — like when your media companies conglomerated successfully.
Vocabulary lists containing conglomerate
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Musk talks as though his vision is to cobble together a conglomerate by defining all his interests as elements of a “super-intelligence” future.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 27, 2026
JBS,” Lahn said, taking aim at the Brazilian-based conglomerate that is the largest meatpacking company in the United States.
From Slate ● Oct. 26, 2026
A third phase of 52 turbines had been awarded to Indian conglomerate Adani, but the government cancelled the contract in 2025 after a dispute over the price per kilowatt-hour.
From Barron's ● Oct. 25, 2026
Now, the U.S.-backed government in Caracas is carving up Rincón’s sprawling Grupo Lamar conglomerate and allowing outside investors to manage pieces of it.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 23, 2026
“You had the whole McKay conglomerate in the soup today.”
From "Boy 2.0" by Tracey Baptiste
SpaceX doesn’t directly compete with China’s launch providers; the nation’s two major conglomerates and its legion of startups primarily sell to their own government.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 20, 2026
His portfolio, taken together, suggests a particular interest in the invisible forces governing everyday life: particulates, sundown, industrial produce conglomerates.
From Salon ● Aug. 14, 2026
He is now one of the few individual casino operators in town in an era when most hotels are owned or operated by publicly traded conglomerates, private-equity firms and real-estate investment trusts.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026
SK Group began as a textile company in 1953 but quickly grew across a wide swath of industries to become one of South Korea's biggest conglomerates.
From BBC ● Jul. 24, 2026
Self- worth tends to be narrowly defined by admission to a few highly selective universities and prestigious, high-paying jobs at conglomerates like Samsung, Hyundai, and LG.
From "Escape from Camp 14: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West" by Blaine Harden
"All of these are just in a kind of conglomerated business under Elon Musk's name."
From BBC ● Jun. 8, 2026
Late on Monday, Abu Dhabi-based conglomerated International Holding Co. said it will make a $381 million investment into Adani Enterprises.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 31, 2023
The former is supposed to lead to the latter, as it seemingly has for the five companies conglomerated under the intimidating acronym FAANG.
From New York Times ● Sep. 15, 2021
I’ve written extensively elsewhere with co-authors about why it makes sense for media companies to break apart rather than stay conglomerated.
From Forbes ● Mar. 26, 2015
It is more probable that they were at length fast frozen up in some inlet, or that small floating fields of ice have conglomerated around them, and bound them in icy fetters to the mainland.
From Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 423 Volume 17, New Series, February 7, 1852 by William Chambers
Possible answers invoke myriad world-making methods, from titanic impacts to the gluing together of spaceborne hail, where the conglomerating force of gravity may battle disruptions from magnetic whirlpools that nascent worlds are thought to encounter.
From New York Times ● Jul. 23, 2021
“The Globes have exhibited some amount of prescience in conglomerating film and television,” said Matti Leshem, a movie producer and the chief executive of Protagonist, a Hollywood branding company.
From New York Times ● Jan. 11, 2013
Maurice Greenberg, a Russian immigrant, started the Connecticut Leather Co. in Hartford in 1932 to sell supplies to shoemakers, but his sons Arnold and Leonard began conglomerating in the 1960s.
From Time Magazine Archive
In an era when most multinational firms have given up their old conglomerating ways, Jardines retains a panoply of seemingly unconnected businesses.
From Time Magazine Archive
In June the military chiefs at Washington were vainly doing all that military men could do to make something like the beginnings of an army out of the conglomerating mass.
From Captains of the Civil War; a chronicle of the blue and the gray by William Charles Henry Wood
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