Disney layoffs, and other painful cuts!! 3 3

[drotto]

Not sure where this belongs or what it meam, but here it is.

 

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/disney-to-announce-layoffs-cost-cutting-measures-wsj-2022-11-11

Edited November 12, 2022 by drotto

[paperheart]

On 11/12/2022 at 8:13 AM, drotto said:

Not sure where this belongs or what it meam, but here it is.

 

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/disney-to-announce-layoffs-cost-cutting-measures-wsj-2022-11-11

One obvious target that you've mentioned before is film budgets. If $750-850M is the new norm for the MCU, they can't justify spending $250M on production and another $150M on advertising.

[Bosco685]

On 11/14/2022 at 12:04 PM, paperheart said:

One obvious target that you've mentioned before is film budgets. If $750-850M is the new norm for the MCU, they can't justify spending $250M on production and another $150M on advertising.

And now learning that Disney+ has cost the company - $8B (to include accounting for content cost from the $71.3B Fox acquisition) I wonder if this will lead to new or enhanced metrics to account for show benefits/returns?

[drotto]

On 11/14/2022 at 12:20 PM, Bosco685 said:

And now learning that Disney+ has cost the company - $8B (to include accounting for content cost from the $71.3B Fox acquisition) I wonder if this will lead to new or enhanced metrics to account for show benefits/returns?

Very hard to justify $100 million plus on 8 episodes of a shows, when it is very difficult to assess the monetary return.

 

Also think investors will start demanding better metrics overall for views and popularity of streaming shows.  The investor is thinking we spend $20 million per episode on this show, show me realistic numbers on how many watched, and what our return was.

[piper]

On 11/14/2022 at 11:20 AM, drotto said:

Very hard to justify $100 million plus on 8 episodes of a shows, when it is very difficult to assess the monetary return.

 

Also think investors will start demanding better metrics overall for views and popularity of streaming shows.  The investor is thinking we spend $20 million per episode on this show, show me realistic numbers on how many watched, and what our return was.

On the other hand, unless they keep up the production quality up for new content, I likely won't retain my subscription.  I'm not interested in Disney's back catalogue.  I watch the new stuff (e.g. Andor).

[Bosco685]

Disney Terminating Thousands of Employees Effective Immediately

Quote

These layoffs have come in phases, with the third round of planned layoffs starting today, May 22, 2023. This third round is expected to affect roughly 2,500 positions via Deadline.

 

The layoffs were not expected to hit the theme park division hard, though they have been affected. The target of this third round is not specified.

 

One of Disney’s biggest controversies and, ultimately, one of its biggest failures can be found in the now-defunct Galactic Starcruiser. Earlier this month, Disney revealed that it would be permanently closing this immersive Star Wars-themed hotel experience.

 

[media_junkie]

I'm still stunned they had the nerve to charge upwards of $6,000 for two nights for a cosplay camp.  Whoever green lit this was either insane or woe fully out of touch (or both).

[theCapraAegagrus]

On 5/25/2023 at 6:43 AM, media_junkie said:

Whoever green lit this was either insane or woe fully out of touch (or both).

Seems to be most executives in today's world.

[drotto]

Disney is also removing 50 plus shows form D+ and Hulu including Willow (that was money well spent), and Y the Lst Man. They will be using them as a tax write off. It is being reported that Dinsey has around $10 to $12 billion in liquid assets (down from around $20 billion a few years ago).  The problem is Comcast is going to force Disney to buy Hulu, both sides have signaled this will happen. Price tag likely $9 to $11 billion.  

 

Those closures, tax write offs, and layoffs, start to make a lot of sense in light of that forced acquisition. 

[media_junkie]

Granted I'm not in the game of high stakes corporations, but how can Comcast force Disney to buy Hulu?    

 

 And never mind, a quick google search gave the answer.

Edited May 26, 2023 by media_junkie

[drotto]

On 5/25/2023 at 8:27 PM, media_junkie said:

Granted I'm not in the game of high stakes corporations, but how can Comcast force Disney to buy Hulu?    

 

 And never mind, a quick google search gave the answer.

Yeap, it's true.  I was listening to a podcast today explaining it further.  Apparently, Disney is the one valuing Hulu at about $27 billion, meaning Comcast's share would be that $9 billion number.  There was a market evaluation a few years ago that put Hulu closer to $70 billion (according to the Wall Street Journal)!!!!! That number would put Disney on the hook for $23 billion, that they may not have without selling stock.  Comcast will likely push for a even higher evaluation, and what more.  In addition, Comcast may be initiating a lawsuit claiming Disney is intentionally trying to devalue Hulu by pulling and withholding content from the platform. Getting very messy.

 

This means this is likely going to arbitration to set a value of Hulu, so it is currently unknown what this could cost Disney.  That Iger purchase of FOX is looking worse and worse, since that is where Disney got their share of Hulu from.  

[MR SigS]

On 5/25/2023 at 3:43 AM, media_junkie said:

I'm still stunned they had the nerve to charge upwards of $6,000 for two nights for a cosplay camp.  Whoever green lit this was either insane or woe fully out of touch (or both).

At those prices it was doomed to fail, but if they had gone with the original trilogy as its theme, they certainly would have done better than they did. 

[drotto]

Some more reports that Camcast may ask $23 billion for their 1/3 share.

[Bosco685]

Quote

Bob Iger shifts from building an empire to a Disney yard sale
Bob Iger built Disney into the world’s most powerful entertainment company by acquiring Pixar, Marvel and Lucasfilm. Now he’s looking to downsize.

 

Iger put roughly a third of the company up for sale this week, declaring Disney’s linear TV assets noncore. That includes TV networks ABC, FX and Freeform. He also said Disney is looking for a strategic partner for ESPN — though he’s not willing to sell the whole thing — and the company is already looking to sell or restructure its TV and streaming business in India.

 

It’s a stunning if inevitable turn of events for an executive who spent so much of his career working in TV, and for a company that relied on cable networks for the majority of its profit. Before the pandemic, Disney’s media networks generated 35%, or $24.8 billion, of company revenue and more than 50%, or $7.5 billion, of its operating income.

 

Yet the accelerating decline of cable TV has limited Iger’s options. He thought he’d solved this problem with Disney+ and Hulu, his two mass-market streaming services. But his streaming business is expected to register a loss of about $800 million in the company’s just-ended third quarter.

 

Management chased streaming subscribers at unsustainably low prices to goose the launch of Disney+ in 2019 and is now seeking to raise prices without alienating customers. (Disney+ lost 4 million subscribers last quarter.)

 

Iger put up a for-sale sign during an interview with CNBC in Sun Valley, Idaho, home to an annual summit of the media and tech elite organized by the investment bank Allen & Co. The conference has long served as an incubator for some of the media industry’s most high-profile deals — and a source of endless photos of executives walking in Patagonia vests.

 

It’s not yet clear how serious Iger is about selling entire TV networks. ABC, for example, is key to retaining NBA rights. FX has been a key supplier of programming to Hulu, which Iger plans to keep and fold into Disney+.

 

Yet Iger’s CNBC interview was unmistakably a distress signal. Disney is contractually obligated to buy Comcast Corp.’s one-third stake in Hulu in a deal that would value the business at least at $27.5 billion. It’s also wrestling with a colossal debt pile stemming from its $71.3 billion acquisition of 21st Century Fox in 2019.

 

A sale of the TV business could fetch around $8 billion, according to Wells Fargo analyst Steve Cahall — which would largely offset the cost of acquiring the piece of Hulu it doesn't yet own. Most of the potential suitors for linear TV networks are financial entities, like private equity firms, that would milk them for cash as they decline into obscurity.

 

The list of interested parties in ESPN is longer, and could include tech giants like Apple, as well as sports companies like Fanatics. The streaming side of the sports giant, ESPN+, remains more of a niche business. But Disney continues to signal it will offer all of ESPN outside of the cable bundle in the near future.

 

Iger came back to Disney last November a conquering hero eager to rescue the company from the era of Bob Chapek (his successor and predecessor). He said he’d only stick around for two years, a deadline few took seriously given Iger’s inability to relinquish control during his first stint as CEO.

 

After receiving a two-year contract extension this past week, Iger has three more years to clean up a big mess that also includes a slowdown in the company’s theme-park business, a series of misses for the company’s film division and the strike by Hollywood actors and writers against all of the media companies.

 

Rumors have long swirled that Iger will end up selling all of Disney to Apple. It’s still hard to imagine Iger selling Disney to anyone. He was always a builder — not a seller. But Bob the builder is doing a lot more cutting this time around.

 

Iger’s comments should spook his peers. If a diversified company like Disney is bailing on its cable networks, what does that mean for companies like Paramount Global and Warner Bros Discovery Inc.? They still make almost all of their profit from networks that are shrinking.

 

[TupennyConan]

 

[dover]

I would love a return to Walt's Disney. As a lifelong fan, remembering them coming to Florida, corporate-lost Disney has been sad to watch. 

[Silver Surfer]

I use to look forward to the next Marvel movie release until they started to produce extra woke krap. I still can’t get over what they did with the last Thor movie Takia should never be allowed near another Marvel set again. 

[Bosco685]

 

[Dr. Balls]

On 8/15/2023 at 3:40 PM, Bosco685 said:

 

[drotto]

Gotta love movie accounting