parent company

American  

noun

• parent companies
  plural

1. a corporation or other business enterprise that owns controlling interests in one or more subsidiary companies (distinguished from holding company).

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parent company British  

noun

1. a company that owns more than half the shares of another company

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• parent companies
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of parent company

First recorded in 1865–70

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

parent company

“Taken together, we expect these sources to fund the significant majority of our capital needs through 2027, with only a limited amount expected to be raised at the parent company level.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 11, 2026

"Alphabet shares battered" writes the Financial Times, saying that Google's parent company "has burnt through cash" which "deepens investor fears over AI returns".

From BBC ● Oct. 30, 2026

The original Google ethical mission statement, “Don’t be evil,” was dropped, and the parent company, Alphabet, now uses the decidedly thinner “Do the right thing.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 30, 2026

Google’s cloud business grew 103% year over year, boosted by demand for AI infrastructure and services, helping parent company Alphabet report 25% revenue growth for the quarter, the WSJ reports.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 29, 2026

My team and I persuaded Darden Restaurants, the parent company behind chains like Olive Garden and Red Lobster, to make changes to the kinds of food it offered and how it was prepared.

From "Becoming" by Michelle Obama

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