• According to the board of directors, Disney CEO Bob Iger is “best suited to lead the company”
• As of 2020, Iger had been Disney CEO for 15 years
• Iger’s successor Bob Chapek was actually only renewed as CEO in the summer
“Entrepreneur of the Year”, “One of the Most Powerful People in the World”, “Best CEO in the World”, “Most Powerful Entrepreneur”: these are just a few of the awards Disney CEO Bob Iger has received over the years from Forbes, Fortune and other business magazines had received. On November 20, 2022, the popular entrepreneur has resumed his post as CEO of the media giant for a two-year term, effective immediately. “The board of directors has determined that Bob Iger is the best person to lead the company at an increasingly complex time of industry change,” Disney board chairman Susan Arnold said in a press release released the same day.
What makes Bob Iger so valuable to Walt Disney?
In fact, hardly anyone knows Disney as well as Iger: The 71-year-old has worked for the company for more than 40 years, 20 of which he was on the board of directors, five years as COO and from 2005 to 2020 also as CEO. He was also appointed CEO, but left that post in 2021.
During his years as CEO, Walt Disney has grown tremendously thanks to a series of major acquisitions. Iger bought Pixar in 2006, followed by the takeover of Marvel in 2009, Lucasfilm including the rights to the Star Wars productions was acquired in 2012 and finally 21st Century Fox was also integrated into Disney in 2019. Iger also prepared the launch of the Disney+ streaming platform. Between 2005 and 2019, the company’s annual sales grew from just under $32 billion to nearly $70 billion. In 2021, Disney+ enjoyed great popularity as a Netflix competitor and had 118.1 million subscribers by the end of the year. In line with this success, which in the eyes of the Disney board of directors is largely thanks to Iger, the group was repeatedly named the most popular company and best employer by the major business magazines between 2006 and 2021.
Corona and the high inflation are also noticeable at Disney
But Disney is not immune to the consequences of global crises such as the corona pandemic or the high inflation rate. Add to that a costly legal battle with actress Scarlett Johansson over the film Black Widow, and the company has been targeted by investors like Dan Loeb, who want to be involved in important decisions for their funds. Disney shares came under severe pressure as a result of consumers’ reduced willingness to spend due to inflation, so that the new CEO Bob Chapek, who Iger had chosen himself, had to announce austerity measures such as a hiring freeze and job cuts.
Chapek will now be replaced again by Iger – even though his contract was only extended to 2024 in the summer of 2022.
Iger wants to heavily restructure parts of the company
Exactly why Chapek resigned from his post and whether he was pushed by Disney management can only be speculated about. In any case, it is now up to the new (old) CEO Iger, who was only knighted in September by the late Queen Elizabeth II, to get the company back on track. An internal email from Bob Iger to employees, available to news portal Reuters, reveals plans for the Disney Media & Entertainment Distribution department to be restructured and for its chairman, Kareem Daniel, to be fired. In the course of this, the creative team will be given more personal responsibility in the future and will be able to make more decisions for themselves.
Apparently, one of Bob Iger’s core tasks as CEO is to work closely with the board of directors to look for a suitable successor and prepare him for the post. As the Handelsblatt reports, before returning to Walt Disney, Iger had made it very clear that he was not interested in a new post at the media and entertainment giant – so the talks must have taken place at very short notice. Incidentally, Iger’s salary appears to be $1 million a year, a $25 million long-term bonus, and an annual performance-based bonus.
Olga Rogler / Editor finanzen.net
Leverage must be between 2 and 20
No data
More news about Walt Disney
Image sources: Alexandre Tziripouloff / Shutterstock.com, chrisdorney / Shutterstock.com