According to The Hollywood Reporter, Disney CEO Bob Iger has walked back from previous considerations of spinning off the company’s TV assets from its streaming business.
Following the finalized deal with Comcast for ownership of Hulu, Disney has stated that they are no longer considering selling off their linear TV networks. The idea was first floated by Bob Iger in 2023, when he mentioned that, along with other restructuring efforts, the company was exploring several possibilities, including selling off its linear networks like ABC.
At that time, both cable and streaming were on a decline. Mr. Iger also reported that Disney was trying to determine whether it would try to buy Hulu or sell their shares. Research has now determined that Disney’s best action would be to purchase full ownership in Hulu and retain its networks.
Mr. Iger gave the following statement to David Faber in a recent interview:
“Soon after I returned to Disney, I put everything on the table and asked the team to evaluate whether we should buy Hulu or whether we should sell Hulu, whether we should sell our linear television networks or whether we should hold on to them, and after a pretty lengthy process internally, and really taking a long look at what these properties could mean to us, long term, we decided that the best course for us to take was to not only buy [Hulu] in its entirety, but also to hold on to the linear television networks and to integrate them seamlessly with our streaming business. What that has enabled us to do is aggregate revenue, both on the sub fee side and on the advertising side. There is still enough linear television subscribers to generate a significant amount of revenue in advertising and in subscription fees. We program them seamlessly, we manage them in one organization. And so there’s been great economies of scale in doing that.”
Mr. Iger’s statement comes in the wake of HBO and Comcast’s announcements regarding splitting off some of their own linear networks. Iger noted that “these spin-off companies won’t have the assets from a streaming perspective that we will have.”
Surprised that Disney has decided against selling off TV assets?