The Walt Disney Co., after some cage-rattling by activist investor Daniel Loeb, has added former Viacom and Facebook exec Carolyn Everson to its board of directors.
11.09.2022 - 23:05 / variety.com
Cynthia Littleton Business Editor Activist investor Daniel S. Loeb of Third Point has backed off his proposal from last month for Disney to divest itself of ESPN in order to devote even more resources to content creation for streaming platforms. Loeb sent two Twitter messages early Sunday morning that amounted to an olive branch to Disney and its CEO Bob Chapek. Loeb said he had gained a “better understanding” of Disney’s plans to more deeply integrate ESPN into its direct-to-consumer operations and the emerging Disney bundle of channels. The social media missive signals that Loeb will not step up his public pressure on Disney and seek to field an alternative slate of directors at the company’s annual meeting next spring.
“We have a better understanding of @espn’s potential as a standalone business and another vertical for $DIS to reach a global audience to generate ad and subscriber revenues. We look forward to seeing Mr. Pitaro execute on the growth and innovation plans, generating considerable synergies as part of The Walt Disney company,” Loeb wrote.We have a better understanding of @espn's potential as a standalone business and another vertical for $DIS to reach a global audience to generate ad and subscriber revenues. We look forward to seeing Mr. Pitaro execute on the growth contd. https://t.co/Gobvf8KS2w Loeb made headlines on Aug. 15 when he issued an open letter to Disney calling for the company to divest ESPN and accelerate its acquisition of Comcast’s outstanding 33% stake in Hulu. Loeb revisited an argument that has been gaining steam in investor circles for more than decade that ESPN and Disney would be better off as separate entities. But in interviews with Variety and other media outlets on Saturday
The Walt Disney Co., after some cage-rattling by activist investor Daniel Loeb, has added former Viacom and Facebook exec Carolyn Everson to its board of directors.
backed down from that recommendation. Disney said in a statement Friday that it has “agreed to customary standstill, voting and other provisions through Disney’s 2024 Annual Meeting of Shareholders” with Third Point.
It has been quite a week for legendary Stone Roses frontman Ian Brown - after his decision to go it alone on his new solo tour without a live band. But while that decision infuriated some of his fans, he could most definitely count on the backing of one of his biggest fans - in the form of Liam Gallagher.
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Cynthia Littleton Business Editor Julia Boorstin, CNBC’s senior media and tech correspondent, put her pandemic lockdown downtime to good use. She went all in on a book that examines female leadership in business, how it’s changing and how those management styles are changing business. “When Women Lead,” to be published next month by Simon & Schuster, is a deeply reported work that brings a global perspective to examining the state of female managers at companies large and small. One fact that stood out like a neon sign in her research was the shockingly low percentage of venture capital dollars that flow into female-led firms. Her anecdotal research only reinforced how much conscious bias there is among VCs who are hunting for founders that look like Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg.
Cynthia Littleton Business Editor In a sign of big moves to come for Roku, veteran TV executive Charlie Collier is exiting his post as chairman of Fox Entertainment to join the digital distribution platform as president of Roku Media. Collier will oversee advertising sales and content for Roku’s owned-and-operated channels featured on the streaming platform that hosts the fast-growing number of free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) channels as well as serving as a key funnel for Netflix, HBO Max, Disney+, Paramount+ and other subscription streamers. Collier is set to shift to his new post at Roku in late October and will be based in New York.
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Cynthia Littleton Business Editor Tel Aviv-based Donna and Shula Productions and “Tehran” director Daniel Syrkin have set a joint venture to develop TV series for the global market, with an emphasis on the U.S. and Europe. Donna and Shula Productions leaders Dana Eden and Shula Spiegel have shepherded two seasons of the espionage drama series “Tehran” with Syrkin. The series debuted in June 2020 on Israel’s Kan 11 broadcast network. Apple TV+ quickly picked up the show, making it the first non-English series to premiere on the platform. “Tehran” bowed on Apple TV+ in 2021 and the streaming giant partnered with Kan 11 on the production of a second season that premiered in May.
BreAnna Bell The television industry has been laser-focused on the transition to streaming in recent years, but that doesn’t mean that the linear side is being ignored or neglected. That was the message Thursday from Kareem Daniel, chairman of Disney Media and Entertainment Distribution, the unit that oversees all TV and film distribution and monetization within the Disney empire. Daniel was a keynote speaker at Variety‘s Entertainment & Technology Summit at 1 Hotel in West Hollywood. “We’ve always had the focus internally about the variety of platforms that we have in [Disney Media and Entertainment Distribution], or the variety of experience touchpoints that we have across the Walt Disney Company with consumers –– that is no less of a priority now than it ever has been. And we tie these organizations together in a way that, again, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts,” he said.
With a bit more than a year left before Disney can buy out Comcast’s financial stake in Hulu, Comcast CEO Brian Roberts pushed back on Disney CEO Bob Chapek’s suggestion that Hulu’s value has declined amid public market skepticism about streaming.
Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Is there a bidding war brewing over Hulu? Comcast chairman and CEO Brian Roberts called Hulu a “phenomenal business” — and said that if Disney were willing to sell it, the cable and media company would be interested in buying it out. “Hulu’s a phenomenal business. Its scale is fantastic. It has wonderful content,” Roberts said, speaking Wednesday at Goldman Sachs’ Communacopia + Technology Conference 2022 in San Francisco. “If it was up for sale, Comcast would be interested” in buying 100% of Hulu, and “others would I think as well.” Disney currently owns 66% of Hulu and Comcast holds the remaining 33% stake. As of July 2, 2022, Disney recorded Comcast’s interest in Hulu as being worth $8.6 billion, implying a valuation of $25.8 billion. In an auction-style sale of Hulu in its entirety, Roberts suggested, Hulu may fetch more than that.
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Disney CEO Bob Chapek is opening up about ESPN as activist investor Daniel Loeb had been pressuring the company to spin off the sports network.
reported Sunday.“We have a better understanding of ESPN’s potential as a standalone business and another vertical for Disney to reach a global audience to generate ad and subscriber revenues,” Loeb tweeted Sunday. “We look forward to seeing Mr.
Cynthia Littleton Business Editor “You should see the backstage,” actor Diego Luna told the D23 Expo crowd Saturday morning as he talked up his new “Star Wars”-branded Disney+ series “Andor” to the 5,000 faithful fans who packed the Anaheim Convention Center. The assembly of boldface names that were brought out at the three-day Disney fan event for a wave and brief chat about upcoming projects was a visual representation of the breadth of content produced by the studio these days. The list of boldface names included Harrison Ford, Angela Bassett, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Paul Rudd, Brie Larson, Tom Hiddleston, Don Cheadle, Owen Wilson, Zoe Saldana, Giancarlo Esposito, Christian Slater, Pedro Pascal, Gael Garcia Bernal, Anthony Ramos and more.The star power on display was impressive and so was the brand power that Disney flexed during D23 Expo by releasing dozens of trailers, teasers and first looks at content bound for Disney+ and theaters in the coming year. The rapid-fire delivery of “Coming Soon” messages was music to the ears of Disney CEO Bob Chapek, who has been telling investors and others that Disney+’s has yet to fully hit its stride in content delivery because of pandemic disruptions.
Disney’s chief financial officer Christine McCarthy said today, “We like the hand we have with ESPN,” calling the sports network and streamer an important piece of the broader portfolio.