Walt Disney Studios is reportedly about to put up its "For Sale" sign soon. According to the company's CEO, Bob Iger, his new strategy to save the company from the crisis would involve divesting a third of the mouse company's assets. Some of those affected by Iger's decision are ABC, Freeform, FX, Disney Channel, Disney Junior, Disney XD, National Geographic, Nat Geo Wild, FXX and FX Movie Channel.
The decision has yet to be made and there is still a lot of work to be done, which the company's executive explained to CNBC's journalist David Faber at the annual Allen & Co. conference in Sun Valley, Idaho: "After coming back, I realized the company is facing a lot of challenges, some of them self-inflicted." One of them could be linear television:
The challenges are greater than I had anticipated. The disruption of the traditional TV business is most notable. If anything, the disruption of that business has happened to a greater extent than even I was aware.
Linear TV may 'not be core' to Disney
They are not yet clear on what to do with them but, the CEO said, they will maintain "expansive" thinking about their usefulness and, if necessary, may decide to sell them, as reported by Deadline:
We have to be open-minded and strategic about the future of those businesses. They may not be core to Disney. The creativity and content they create is core to Disney, but the distribution model, the business model that forms the underpinning of that business, and that has delivered great profits over the years, is definitely broken. And we have to call it like it is. That’s part of the transformative work that we’re doing.
Days later, Bloomberg reported that several channels were put up for sale. In addition, the media outlet also reported that the sports network, ESPN, was looking for a strategic partner. However, unlike the rest of the television channels, this one would still continue to be linked to the Walt Disney Company, since it is profitable for them.
