In a surprise announcement Tuesday afternoon, Walt Disney Co. said longtime CEO Bob Iger was stepping down immediately, to be succeeded by Bob Chapek, most recently chairman of Disney’s parks, experiences and products business. Iger will remain executive chairman through the end of his contract on Dec. 31, 2021. Besides leading the board, Iger said he will spend more time on Disney’s creative endeavors.
It’s been a magical year for Disney. The stock is up nearly 35%. The movie studio already has six billion-dollar box office smashes, with Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker potentially becoming the seventh. And the Disney+ streaming service launched to rave reviews and made “Baby Yoda” a pop culture phenomenon. So what can Disney CEO Bob Iger, who Time recently named its Businessperson of the Year, possibly do for an encore?.
There are more than 10 million reasons why The Walt Disney Co. chairman and CEO Bob Iger is Multichannel News’s executive of the year for 2019. The first 10 million are the larger-than-expected number of people who signed up for the Disney+ streaming service on Nov. 12, the first day it was available.
Disney boss Bob Iger, Nickelodeon and Oxygen co-founder Geraldine Laybourne, director Jay Sendrich and performers Seth MacFarlane and Cicely Tyson have been chosen as the latest members of the Television Academy’s Hall of Fame. The 25th Hall class unveiled Tuesday will be inducted in a ceremony Jan. 28 at the TV Academy’s Saban Media Center in North Hollywood.
Disney+ looks like the future of the house of mouse. It could also define the CEO’s legacy when he retires in 2021.
Exclusives
The conversation today between Vanity Fair Editor-in-Chief Radhika Jones and Walt Disney Chairman-CEO Bob Iger and filmmaker Jon Favreau was largely about the upcoming Disney+ streaming series Star Wars: The Mandalorian, but toward the end of their chat, Jones put the Mouse boss in the hot seat over his $66 million compensation last year, as well as his thoughts on a wealth tax that’s being pitched by Democratic presidential candidates.
In a roller-coaster year of megamergers and megadeals, The Hollywood Reporter’s ranking of showbiz’s top execs, makers and stars sees big moves and a more dynamic (and diverse) group of powerhouses. While Disney CEO Bob Iger retains his status as No. 1 (acquiring the $71.3 billion Fox assets and generating a record $8 billion at the box office make that choice an easy one), moving up on the list are figures including Shari Redstone (No. 4), who’ll see the Viacom-CBS merger she masterminded come to fruition this year.
Disney+ leads a wave of billion-dollar Netflix competitors that are transforming the entertainment industry and launching a new age of ambition (and anxiety) as CEO Bob Iger, Kevin Mayer and team explain their all-in strategy: “We’re locked and loaded.”
Hollywood’s nicest C.E.O. on the great family dramas of Hollywood — and why he, too, is disturbed by Twitter.
Disney CEO Bob Iger said that the company “chose to deal with privately” with the past incidents of current Disney employees Jimmy Kimmel and Joy Behar darkening their skin, both of which have resurfaced in recent months. Those issues were brought up at Disney’s annual shareholder meeting on Thursday.
While much of the media business is getting ready to cash in on legalized wagering, Walt Disney Co. CEO Bob Iger doesn’t expect the squeaky clean company to place bets on gambling. “I don’t see the Walt Disney Co., certainly in the near terms, getting involved in the business of gambling by facilitating gambling in any way,” he said Tuesday.
When 21st Century Fox and Disney each bring shareholders together in New York on Friday to vote on whether the companies should merge, the two people who struck the $71.3 billion deal — Rupert Murdoch and Robert A. Iger — will not be in attendance. But it’s no big deal. Although required by law, the vote is perfunctory at this point.
Disney-Fox Is A Lousy Deal For Consumers
Can anyone with even the most nominal understanding of these businesses argue that having one company own the ESPN channel group along with the Fox regional sports channels would be good for consumers and competition?
The $50 billion deal, which could be announced this week, would mark a significant turning point in the empire-building career of Fox’s founder and executive chairman, 86-year-old Rupert Murdoch. It would also be a defining moment for Disney and its CEO Robert Iger. It’s just the kind of consolidation media investors have said was long overdue.
Robert Iger, the 66-year-old chief executive of entertainment giant Walt Disney Co., is starting to find his voice on matters having nothing to do with PG-rated blockbusters or amusement park rides. And he is emerging as a credible contender in the 2020 presidential speculation game.
America must face its problem with gun violence, the Disney CEO said Tuesday, citing the long list of mass shootings in the United States. Those shootings prompted little in the way of legislation. “These are incidents that touch everybody,” Iger said. “Where is the outrage here? This is a huge crisis for our country. We should demand a dialogue about this from our politicians.”
No, the cable bundle isn’t dead. It’s more like an aging dictator who’s starting to show signs of weakness. Those around it, meanwhile, are already agitating for change. In the last few months in particular, there has been growing evidence of this revolution. After tiptoeing around the demise of the bundle for years, Disney CEO Bob Iger is finally taking bigger steps to ensure his company’s viability, with or without the traditional cable bundle.
Disney Gearing Up To Stream ESPN Lite
Disney CEO Bob Iger says the company has bought a $1 billion stake in Major League Baseball’s streaming platform and will use it to launch a new ESPN-branded channel that will not siphon off signature programs or major sports from the cable-based ESPN services. “We view this as a complementary service.”
Disney shares slipped Tuesday as investors coped with newfound uncertainty about the entertainment giant’s leadership, after the unexpected resignation on Monday of the company’s No. 2 executive and heir apparent to CEO Bob Iger. Shares were down 2.3% at $96.40 midday Tuesday, the first trading day after Disney said Thomas Staggs would depart next month after 14 months as COO and likely successor to Iger, whose contract runs through June 2018.
Disney reported Wednesday in an SEC filing that its Chairman-CEO Bob Iger made $44.9 million in total compensation during the company’s fiscal 2015. That’s down from 2014, when he collected $46.5M, but don’t feel too bad for him: last year’s total marked a 35.5% rise from the year before.
Disney chief executive Bob Iger believes the reality of bringing an NFL team to Los Angeles is moving closer. In an interview Thursday with KCBS Los Angeles Sports Director Jim Hill, Iger — recently named non-executive chairman overseeing a proposed football stadium project in Carson, Calif., that would house the San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders — said a “real serious effort” was going to be put forth to “resolve something” in a meeting with NFL team owners next month.
The San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders have reached an agreement for Bob Iger, Disney chairman and CEO, to become chairman of their bid to build a stadium in Carson, Calif., according to sources with knowledge of the situation. It’s a potentially game-changing move that could propel those teams to the Los Angeles market by next season.
Disney Chairman-CEO Robert Iger’s compensation jumped to $43.7 million in 2014. The change came in the form of a larger bonus: $22.8 million, up 68% from the year before. The company disclosed the compensation package Friday in its annual proxy statement filed with regulators.
Disney’s Iger To Choose Successor Soon
Sources say it’s between Tom Staggs, the chairman of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, and Jay Rasulo, the senior EVP and chief financial officer of The Walt Disney Co.
Disney’s Iger Could Be Next MLB Commish
Disney boss Bob Iger is firmly in Major League Baseball’s potential lineup of new commissioner candidates, according to sources. The Disney chairman and CEO — who oversees ABC and ESPN as part of his role — is a favorite of the league’s succession committee, sources say, which is trying to find a replacement for Bud Selig before he steps down at the end of his contract Jan. 24.
Bob Iger received compensation valued at $34.3 million for the year, down from $37.1 million last year.His compensation fell because the Walt Disney Co. didn’t exceed internal goals by as much this year as it did in 2012, according to a company regulatory filing made Monday.
Even though the Disney CEO says he doesn’t want to weigh into the contract dispute, he left analysts with little doubt about his sympathies. Bob Iger told them in his quarterly earnings call that he feels “strongly about the need for broadcasters to be paid adequately” by pay TV providers.
The company’s chairman-CEO was to have relinquished his CEO position and transitioned to the role of executive chairman on April 1, 2015, for 15 months. Nov, he will remain in both his current positions through June 30, 2016
Don’t blame Disney’s ESPN for that super-sized monthly cable bill — blame the RSNs, or regional sports networks. That’s the word from Disney CEO Bob Iger, whose No. 1 cable sports channel has long been under fire for being the most expensive channel on the dial and the main reason households pay so much for TV.
Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Bob Iger received nearly $31.4 million in total compensation last year, an 11.9% increase from 2010, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Apple Inc’s newest board member, Walt Disney Co Chief Executive Officer Bob Iger, bought about $1 million worth of the iPhone maker’s shares earlier this week, a symbolic gesture of confidence in the prospects of the company.
Disney President-CEO Bob Iger has been named to Apple’s board of directors, the company announced on Tuesday. The move strengthens the ties between the tech giant and the studio.
Walt Disney’s Bob Iger will step down as CEO in 2015 after nearly a decade at the helm. Under his new contract, the 60-year-old Iger will add the chairman title next year then give up both titles in March 2015 and serve a final year as executive chairman.
Now that Hulu is on the auction block, its media company owners are making sure the popular online video website gets plenty of exposure. On Wednesday, at investment bank Allen & Co.’s annual gathering of media and tech moguls in Sun Valley, Idaho, Disney CEO Bob Iger told reporters that Hulu’s owners, which includes Disney, were “committed to selling” the 3-year-old venture.
Walt Disney CEO Bob Iger on Tuesday said he did not believe the NFL work stoppage would level ESPN’s fourth-quarter ad picture, noting that college football should do much to help take the sting out of a lost pro football campaign.
TheWrap’s annual survey of mogul paystubs found that the same executives who made a big show of cutting their paychecks during tough times are now enjoying sizable pay increases.
