Disney cutting back on SW content-what could it mean?

[achilles]

Too get into rumor and speculation land about the "what does it mean" part, I understand from publications who claim to have seen the required SEC filings that Eisner has a huge incentives part of his contract. I've heard...and keep in mind the rumor bit, that it amounts to five times his claimed base compensation package of around $27 million-----IF he hits all his targets, which typically would include various metrics deemed relevant, like stock price, revenue, profit, EBIT, things like that.

Which implies that he has very many good reasons to want Disney to be as profitable as it can, so stock prices and whatever other metrics he needs are met. To do that at this point, and also considering the billions Disney is going to need to come up with in the next few months for Hulu, he's going to have to start selling stuff. And now that KK has successfully destroyed most of the value of the SW franchise for the near future at least, it's a drag rather than an asset. Why not sell it now? Disney clearly isn't going to do much with it, and maybe someone else can save it. Other parts of Disney might also be on the block. They'll try to sell ABC, but they're not going to get nearly as much for that as they might have twenty years ago unless it come with other things. Disney + probably also is potentially on the block, though it's hard to see who would want to buy it, and to get anyone at all to bite they'd probably have to include some sort of rights to older and possibly new Disney content for streaming on that service. They'll probably want to keep ESPN, but that might prove the most attractive asset they have for sale, so who knows?

The point from a SW perspective is, the content pipeline has probably dried up for the near future, and might have even without the strikes. They might be pulling back in anticipation of a sale of Lucasfilm. Rumor and speculation is all I'd put that at for now.

[DrNewGod]

Too get into rumor and speculation land about the "what does it mean" part, I understand from publications who claim to have seen the required SEC filings that Eisner has a huge incentives part of his contract. I've heard...and keep in mind the rumor bit, that it amounts to five times his claimed base compensation package of around $27 million-----IF he hits all his targets, which typically would include various metrics deemed relevant, like stock price, revenue, profit, EBIT, things like that.

Which implies that he has very many good reasons to want Disney to be as profitable as it can, so stock prices and whatever other metrics he needs are met. To do that at this point, and also considering the billions Disney is going to need to come up with in the next few months for Hulu, he's going to have to start selling stuff. And now that KK has successfully destroyed most of the value of the SW franchise for the near future at least, it's a drag rather than an asset. Why not sell it now? Disney clearly isn't going to do much with it, and maybe someone else can save it. Other parts of Disney might also be on the block. They'll try to sell ABC, but they're not going to get nearly as much for that as they might have twenty years ago unless it come with other things. Disney + probably also is potentially on the block, though it's hard to see who would want to buy it, and to get anyone at all to bite they'd probably have to include some sort of rights to older and possibly new Disney content for streaming on that service. They'll probably want to keep ESPN, but that might prove the most attractive asset they have for sale, so who knows?

The point from a SW perspective is, the content pipeline has probably dried up for the near future, and might have even without the strikes. They might be pulling back in anticipation of a sale of Lucasfilm. Rumor and speculation is all I'd put that at for now.

Disney has invested buckets in SW attractions at their parks. Any sales would require licensing deals as they don't have another property with kind brand power to plug in that they're not using elsewhere. It would also require a very large sales price to prevent a nasty write down.

Your thesis is believable. Tough to execute though.

[BeastieRunner]

Disney has invested buckets in SW attractions at their parks. Any sales would require licensing deals as they don't have another property with kind brand power to plug in that they're not using elsewhere. It would also require a very large sales price to prevent a nasty write down.

Your thesis is believable. Tough to execute though.

I posited the same thing about Pixar but Star Wars, Pixar, and Marvel are so imbued into Disney that a divorce, even ambilacle, would be nigh impossible now.

[clonegeek]

I posited the same thing about Pixar but Star Wars, Pixar, and Marvel are so imbued into Disney that a divorce, even ambilacle, would be nigh impossible now.

The biggest property that I can picture Disney selling would be the Muppets

[ChrisIII]

Yeah, they haven't exactly had much success with them-the weird attempt at an OFFICE style show, don't think MUPPETS NOW lasted too long either. The Mayhem show is getting OK reviews I guess.


The 2011 movie did OK and led to a brief revival but the sequel kind of was meh and is mainly known for it's "cloaked Kermit" meme apart from anything else I think.

[DrNewGod]

NYT has an interesting piece on the SAG+Writer's strike with context for this discussion of Disney's moves. They note that panic reactions to Netflix and the pandemic led executives that don't really know their business into stupid moves.

[ChrisIII]

Guess Lando is back on with Stephen Glover (Donald's brother) now part of the writing/producing team.