[2] When T. Boone Pickens's Mesa Petroleum planned a tender offer for Cities Service in 1981, Freeport-McMoran and Louisiana Land & Exploration agreed to help him.
In response, Martin Marietta started buying Bendix stock with the aim of assuming control over the company.
In 1984, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission commissioners said that the Pac-Man defense was cause for “serious concern,” but balked at endorsing any federal prohibition against the tactic.
The commissioners acknowledged a Pac-Man defense can benefit shareholders under certain circumstances, but emphasized that management, in resorting to this tactic, must bear the burden of proving it is not acting solely out of its desire to stay in office.
[6] In 2009, Cadbury considered trying a Pac-Man defense if no bid emerged to challenge Kraft Foods' hostile offer.