The acquired properties have significant synergies with other Peabody subsidiaries, enabling lower-cost mining and longer mine lives.

"We believe there will be significant synergies," John R. Stafford, the chairman and chief executive of American Home Products, said in an interview yesterday.

"There is a significant synergy of our two product lines."

The deal will create "significant synergies," said John Stafford, American's chief, and analysts heard in that phrase coming job cuts and other economies.

The issue is that the integration of America Online and the Time Warner cable television unit has yet to show significant synergy.

It added that an eventual merger of VimpelCom with Kyivstar could "generate significant synergies, as well as significant operating efficiencies."

Merton explains that the connection between religious affiliation and interest in science is a result of a significant synergy between the ascetic Protestant values and those of modern science.

This is conservatively high since there are some significant synergies possible when there are multiple units on site.

Additionally, significant synergies would have been realized in the Sudbury operations, with both companies performing the same kind of extraction and smelting work on the same kind of ore.

"The National operations would further diversify AK Steel's rich product mix to include tin mill and construction market products and present the opportunity for significant cost-based synergies."