few weeks before Bob Iger sat down for that CNBC interview in which he said Disney’s linear TV networks, like ABC and FX, “may not be core” to the company’s business, a veteran Hollywood executive mused to THR on the possibility of a deal that would rock the industry: Apple buying Disney. It’s an idea that keeps being discussed, even though many top executives have scoffed at it and many still do. Apple doesn’t want to buy a studio, they say, and there’s no way the feds would allow a huge deal like that to go through.
But this observer wasn’t so quick to rule it out. “I don’t think [Apple] would buy the company as it presently exists,” he said. “But if you see Bob start to divest things … that feels like he’s prepping for a sale. And there’s clearly no buyer like Apple.”
Not long after that, Iger went on television and hung a possibly-for-sale sign on Disney’s TV businesses. And just like that, it was a little more possible to see the outlines of a slimmed-down Disney that could be a tempting acquisition target.
There clearly is no buyer like Apple, which is sitting on $62 billion in cash and cash equivalents and has a $2.8 trillion market cap. And while it may be very true that Apple doesn’t want to buy a studio, maybe it would want to buy this studio — Iger the one that, despite the challenges of the moment, has a vault full of priceless IP and remains the most valuable brand in entertainment.
Some Hollywood executives have been anticipating a future in which the studio herd will continue to thin — dramatically. “There will end up being three or four platforms and everybody else gets hollowed out and acquired,” says one industry veteran. “There will be Apple, Amazon, Netflix and one other. If you could put NBCUniversal, Warners and Paramount together, you probably have enough to survive.”