No More Mr. Nice Guy: Bob Iger May Just Want to Sell Disney and Be Done

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For decades, Disney CEO Bob Iger has been a revered media titan, beloved by both employees and Wall Street — a rare feat and tricky balancing act.

That’s what made it so surprising to the creative community when the usually friendly and disciplined Iger, fresh off his private jet at Sun Valley, chose a setting known as “summer camp for billionaires” to castigate writers and actors for their “very disturbing” strike and economic expectations that are “just not realistic,” adding that Hollywood has been “a great business for all of these people.” SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher joined voices across entertainment in calling Iger’s comments “tone deaf” and, well, rich for someone who reportedly makes more than 500 times the median salary of Disney employees.

Why the sudden about-face by Mr. Nice to become the dual strikes’ Dr. Evil? It all may be because he’s got an industry upending deal — a sale of Disney — on his mind, and his primary audience is Wall Street, not Hollywood talent.

Keep in mind, Iger was speaking to CNBC, as direct a megaphone to Wall Street trading floors as you can get. His comments may reflect a desire to present the best possible economic case to his Sun Valley audience — other captains of industry and the financial community whom he needs on his side to cross the goal line. Big-ticket M&A covets stability, rather than transformed basic industry economics. Uncertainty and change don’t translate well into higher price tags for assets. I’ve been on both sides of the table in media acquisition deals and have experienced this first-hand.

Analysts strongly believe Iger is considering a sale of Mouse House assets — he all but put a “for sale” sign on the ABC network in that same CNBC interview. Adding credibility to this M&A scenario are Iger’s recent comments that linear television “may not be core” to Disney’s business, comments he later tried to walk back. Even ESPN, once a sacred cow, is sacred no more, as Iger seeks outside investors to help fund the network’s transition to streaming.

This may well explain why Iger returned last November in the first place. For a man who had done it all at Disney, transforming the company into a franchise mega-hit machine with Marvel, Lucasfilm, Pixar and the Fox studio, why come back unless you have one more career-capping act in mind?

The fact that Disney just re-upped Iger’s contract for two more years through 2026 is utterly consistent with this scenario and a selling state of mind. That’s just enough time to do a deal. Corporate M&A takes several months, if not years, particularly for a deal regulators would certainly scrutinize. Disney’s acquisition of Fox’s entertainment assets took well over a year from start to finish, and Time Warner’s $85 billion sale to AT&T took nearly two. All of Iger’s schmoozing powers would be needed to get a deal done.

Apple’s Tim Cook, another Sun Valley regular, is most assuredly watching this movie. He is the obvious buyer, and an Apple-Disney pairing would be applauded by Wall Street. Both brands scream quality and are among the most respected and beloved around the world. And Apple and Disney have been closely aligned in the media business since 2006, which is the year Disney bought Pixar from Steve Jobs and Apple began selling Disney movies on iTunes. After Jobs died, Iger sat on Apple’s board until 2019. The companies know each other intimately, and that shared DNA and mutual respect bode well for a post-sale integration. A complementary company culture is necessary for any successful M&A.

To be clear, Cook certainly wouldn’t want to buy all of Disney’s assets, like its theme parks, for example. Apple, in great need of franchise content and a deeper content pool for Apple TV+ to more effectively compete with Netflix and Max, would likely seek to acquire just Disney’s prized entertainment assets, leaving the theme parks and TV networks for others to pick over.

Iger has walked that M&A tightrope before. In the Fox deal, he only picked up Fox’s entertainment assets, leaving Fox News to be Rupert Murdoch’s “alternative universe.” A similar structure could grease an Apple-Disney deal past regulators in a hyper-competitive streaming-first world.

Now faced with the added gut punch of looming transformational AI, selling makes sense. It’s like that pivotal ending scene in “The Usual Suspects” when Chazz Palminteri sits back, takes in the entire picture of clues on the wall and drops his cup of coffee at his great epiphany. And for Iger, the Keyser Söze in this movie, selling to Apple represents his dramatic escape.

The writers’ and actors’ strike disrupts that outcome. Iger may say he loves talent, but his history shows he really loves a deal. Iger ultimately answers to Wall Street, like any CEO, and that doesn’t bode well for major concessions in the current Hollywood strike maelstrom.

Iger may have built his reputation as Hollywood’s nice guy, but his last act may be as a calculating executive straight out of central casting.

For those of you interested in learning more, visit Peter’s firm Creative Media at creativemedia.biz and follow him on Twitter @pcsathy. 

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