consortium
Americannoun
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a combination of financial institutions, capitalists, etc., for carrying into effect some financial operation requiring large resources of capital.
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any association, partnership, or union.
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Law. the legal right of partners in a marriage to companionship and conjugal intercourse with each other.
In a wrongful death action the surviving spouse commonly seeks damages for loss of consortium.
noun
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an association of financiers, companies, etc, esp one formed for a particular purpose
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law the right of husband or wife to the company, assistance, and affection of the other
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of consortium
1820–30; < Latin: partnership, equivalent to consort- consort + -ium -ium
Explanation
Consortium is a fancy word for a group you form for an enterprise beyond what any one member could do alone. All the grocery stores in your neighborhood might form a consortium for the promotion of local strawberries. Consortium comes from the verb consort, which means "to accompany or associate." Consortium used to mean "fellowship, participation, society," but these days you're more likely to hear consortium for an association of different institutions like schools or companies than, say, a consortium of philosophical frog lovers. Still, consortiums usually preserve the ideals of fellowship, with every member institution chipping in to reach a common goal.
Vocabulary lists containing consortium
The Boys in the Boat
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"Simon's Saga," Vocabulary from Episode 25
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The Gene
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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.
The SuperC consortium was established in 2023 by Professor Törmä and an international group of leading physicists who share the goal of using quantum physics to help address climate change.
From Science Daily • Jul. 7, 2026
The Joint War Committee, a London-based consortium of underwriters, has added most of the Middle East to its so-called listed areas, or risker areas for ships, since early March.
From MarketWatch • Jun. 26, 2026
A consortium of three developers is undertaking the $30 billion mega-project as part of a public-private partnership.
From Barron's • Jun. 24, 2026
He had positive conversations with Behdad Eghbali, Chelsea's co-owner and the majority shareholder of BlueCo, the consortium which owns both the Blues and Strasbourg.
From BBC • Jun. 23, 2026
Rabi stitched together the new lab’s sponsoring consortium, known as Associated Universities, from nine large Eastern research institutions that would have been hard pressed to compete individually in the multimillion-dollar world of postwar high-energy physics.*
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
