Bob Iger named Times businessperson of the year

Times has named Disney’s Bob Iger businessperson of the year. The achievement comes following the successful launch of Disney+ alongside a record $10 billion in global box office sales, reports CNBC.

“Iger’s tenure as the leader of the world’s most lucrative dream factory has been one long CEO highlight reel,” Belinda Luscombe wrote in her article for Time. “But 2019 was an apex year, when many of his carefully incubated eggs hatched.”

Apart from these successes, Iger closed a $71 billion acquisition of Fox, opened two Star Wars theme parks, gained complete control of Hulu and released the highest-grossing movie in cinematic history, “Avengers Endgame.”

“In 2006, he made a $7.4 billion deal to buy Pixar from a guy who hated Disney,” Luscombe wrote. “Then he bought Marvel, a company built on the mercurial fantasies of adolescent males, then Lucasfilm, when the Star Wars stories seemed burned out.”

“And in a year when the tide has shifted against Big Business, Big Media and Big Tech, Iger has transformed his enormous media company into a gargantuan media and tech business while ensuring that the Walt Disney Co.’s products remain widely beloved,” Luscombe concluded.