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Back to Disney: The Renaissance and the Empire.

How Did ESPN Pay for Pixar, Marvel, and Lucasfilm?

Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say ESPN paid for Pixar, Marvel, and Lucasfilm. Cable was a contractual cash gusher, and the three prices that sounded absurd line up against that profit.

Pixar at $7.4 billion, cash included, was about two and a half years of cable profit then. Marvel at $4 billion was less than one year of cable profit in 2009. Lucasfilm in 2012, another $4 billion, was well under a year. Together that is about four years of ESPN cable profits.

ESPN was the business that threw off cash. The studios were where Disney could put that cash back to work. Warren Buffett pairs a cash producer with a business that can reinvest, and this is the same shape.

Transcript

Disney: The Renaissance and the Empire ·

Acquired

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  2. Why Was Disney Worth More Dead Than Alive in 1984?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say Disney in 1983 was worth more sold for parts than run as a company.
  3. Where Did Future Filmmakers Learn Disney Animation?David Rosenthal says Disney animation was floundering while future filmmakers learned the craft of Disney animation in a small basement room at the California…
  4. When Was Disney's 1984 Boardroom Coup?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal place Disney's boardroom coup on September 7th, 1984. Roy E.
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  6. Why Did Disney Cartoons Become Broadway Musicals?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say Jeffrey Katzenberg turned Disney cartoons into Broadway musicals that happened to be animated, and that switch made the…
  7. How Did Beauty and the Beast Bring Disney Animation Back?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say Beauty and the Beast lit up the box office and showed Disney Animation was back.
  8. Why Did Disney Put Its Classics on VHS?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say that until 1985 there was no way to watch a Disney film outside a theater.
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  10. Why Did Euro Disney Lose Money for Years?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say Euro Disney cost $4 billion to develop and lost money for years.
  11. How Did Frank Wells Die?David Rosenthal says Frank Wells was killed in a helicopter crash while heliskiing on Easter Sunday, 1994, the first of three huge blows that hit Disney in…
  12. How Did DreamWorks Compete With Disney?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal describe DreamWorks, with Steven Spielberg and David Geffen, as a full-stack Disney competitor.
  13. Why Do Cable Companies Pay ESPN?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say ESPN invented a second revenue line for cable networks: the affiliate fee.
  14. How Much of Disney Profit Came From Cable?Ben Gilbert says Disney's cable networks segment accounted for 60% of the entire company's operating income from 2008 to 2011, and analysts believe three…
  15. Why Did Michael Eisner Turn Down AOL?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say one of the best things Michael Eisner did as CEO of the Walt Disney Company, other than buying ESPN, was the deal he…
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  17. Why Did Comcast Try to Buy Disney?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say Comcast, the Philadelphia cable company, made a hostile bid to buy Disney for $54 billion in Comcast stock.
  18. How Did Bob Iger Win the Disney CEO Job?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say Bob Iger won by refusing to defend the past.
  19. Why Did Bob Iger Lose Faith in Disney Animation?Ben Gilbert says Bob Iger, during his CEO audition process, had completely lost faith that Disney animation can be fixed from within.
  20. Why Did George Lucas Sell the Group That Became Pixar?Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal say George Lucas sold the graphics group because he was getting divorced and needed cash.
  21. Why Do Toy Story Animators Move the Body First?Ben Gilbert says Toy Story animators work frame by frame on the bodies first and only later on the faces.
  22. How Long Did Each Toy Story Frame Take to Render?Ben Gilbert says each frame of Toy Story took an hour or two to render, and Pixar could render only three and a half minutes of footage per week.
  23. Why Did Michael Eisner Want Finding Nemo to Fail?David Rosenthal says Michael Eisner wanted Finding Nemo to fail because a flop would give Disney more negotiating leverage over Pixar.
  24. Why Did Disney's Board Approve Buying Pixar?The Disney board forgot to say no because buying Pixar was unthinkable.
  25. Was Disney's Pixar Acquisition a Success?Ben Gilbert says the Pixar acquisition, twenty years on, is an obvious giant success. The first reason is that it clearly saved Disney Animation.
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