On Tuesday, Feb. 25 Disney news was made when CEO Bob Iger stepped down from his role. Who is replacing such an important position at Disney, you might wonder? The Walt Disney Company’s appointment of theme parks head Bob Chapek will be entering the role. Bob Iger will still remain in the Disney way of life for another two years as executive chairman on the board. In his last years with the company, Iger wants to focus on building up Disney’s streaming services including Hulu, Disney+ and ESPN+. With Disney+ taking off and bringing in 28.6 million subscribers to the service due to nostalgic movies and entertaining new shows alike, there is still room for growth in Iger’s eyes. According to Forbes, “Iger credited Chapek with opening the Shanghai Disney resort, doubling the cruise line fleet and opening the new Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge attractions at Disneyland and Walt Disney World (though park attendance initially sagged as visitors waited out the rush for the heavily promoted attraction).”
Bob Chapek was chosen for the role due to his long-standing commitment to the company of 27 years. The Los Angeles Times quoted Bill Coan, Chief Executive of ITEC Entertainment, speaking about Disney’s new CEO stating that “he understands the business from an international perspective, an operating perspective, the development side and from a business perspective. It’s been his job to take the Pixar brand, the Marvel brand and the ‘Star Wars’ brand, and make it function across all these businesses, and we think he’s been very successful at that.” Seeing Disney into its age of streaming services, Chapek will have lots on his plate following Iger’s legacy.
Due to the sudden change in power, there has been uncertainty around Iger’s leaving. This uncertainty has extended to Disney’s stock which fell two percent in aftermarket trading after the announcement. Under Iger, Disney stock rose by 400 percent over his 15 years as CEO. This announcement is not the only thing affecting Disney’s stock market but the looming presence of the Coronavirus has set many companies back recently. Iger initially also had an uncertain reception to taking on the role when he started, although he still managed to build Disney’s profits and success. Even though Iger had to build his reputation as CEO up as well, Wall Street is unhappy with the sudden change to Chapek. Variety speculates that this upset is due to the seemingly unplanned announcement, the enormous respect that Wall Street has for Bob Iger and that they were not expecting Chapek to fill the role. The Disney Direct-to-Consumer and International Chairman Kevin Mayer and Disney Television Chairman and Media Networks co-chair Peter Rice were thought to be serious contenders in the running for the position.
Overall, even though this kind of big change in Disney’s history is something that does not happen every day, the board picked a candidate who they believed would continue the Disney Company’s legacy of storytelling and extraordinary service to customers. Having Iger slowly transition away from the company in the role of executive chairman has assured many of their concerns going forward. We will see what the future has in store with Chapek at the helm of one of the world’s largest conglomerates in the world.
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