Bob Iger, Disney CEO, speaks about idea of spinning off ESPN
By Keith Farner
Published:
Bob Iger held his first quarterly conference call on Wednesday following his return to Disney as CEO, and a point of interest was ESPN’s position in the company.
As ESPN faces increasing headwinds about the growth of its ESPN+ product, and falling subscriber numbers for linear television, Iger was asked about ESPN’s future.
“We’re not engaged in any conversations right now, or considering, a spin-off of ESPN,” Iger said. “That had been done, by the way, in my absence and I’m told the company concluded after exploring it very carefully that it wasn’t something the company wanted to do.”
Speaking more broadly, Iger said the streaming business is going to continue to grow, albeit at the expense of linear programming. “But consumption of television is not decreasing,” he said.
“Regarding ESPN (going direct-to-consumer) and when we might make the shift, if you’re asking me if the shift is inevitable, the answer is yes,” he said. “But I’m not going to give you any sense of when that could be.”
H/T Bryan Fischer.
A former newspaper veteran, Keith Farner is a news manager for Saturday Down South.
