May 6, 2024
Today at
6:20 PM
Now that he has managed to chase away the rebels from his gates, Bob Iger is once again the sole ruler of the Disney entertainment empire. The fortunes of rivals Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery prove just how crucial the Disney renovation Iger is working on is.
Disney
will provide an update on the second quarter on Tuesday. It already contains one major change because the publication comes before the stock exchange in the US and therefore the nightlight will not be on until late at night for the reporter from De Tijd, although a notorious night owl.
Since his return as CEO at the end of 2022, he has been working on a major renovation of the business model. The priority was to stem the billions in losses on the streamer Disney+. That seems to be gradually under control. According to analysts, the operating loss on the streaming division will amount to $114 million, a slight improvement compared to the first quarter. This keeps Iger on track to break even with streaming by the end of 2024 – Disney uses a broken fiscal year that runs until October. In the slightly longer term, he aims for an operating margin of 10 percent and more.
Solid cash flow
Actually, the most important news about Disney can be obtained from other companies. While Iger has the advantage of strong cash flow from his theme parks, rivals like Paramount and Warner Bros Discovery do not. Paramount is in a takeover process and Warner Bros ended up at its lowest stock price ever because its model is basically dead.
Paramount and Warner Bros made billions from classic TV for years, but revenues are shrinking rapidly as people cancel their subscriptions. The alternative – streaming – cannot sufficiently compensate for that loss. Ultimately, Iger doesn’t have a solution for that either. Disney is also left with a TV network that is past its prime as a cash cow. It is unclear what Iger plans to do in that regard. He has one advantage over the falling empires around him: in the merger and acquisition wave, Netflix is a certainty as a survivor of the streaming war, and thanks to Iger, Disney also seems to have good cards to remain an important player.
