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from the only-lost-$500-million-per-month...for-60-consecutive-months dept.
After Buying DirecTV For $50 Billion In 2015, AT&T Now Seeks To Sell It For Under $20 Billion:
How do you destroy $30 billion in value in just five years? If you are AT&T, you buy DirecTV in 2015 for $50 billion and five years later you try to sell it - now renamed to AT&TTV - for less than $20 billion, a loss of 60% on the deal.
That, according to the Wall Street Journal is what AT&T hopes to do as it takes "a fresh look its DirecTV business" exploring a deal for a service wounded by cord-cutting. And by fresh look, the journal means sell.
When AT&T announced plans to acquire DirecTV in May 2014, the vision was to control some 26 million TV subscribers. However, the resulting slump in cable and satellite viewership due to the relentless encroachment of streaming services, the value of DirecTV has seen a sharp drop in recent years and the result is yet another catastrophic media deal. And since the pay-TV unit has shed 7 million U.S. video connections over the past two years, a deal could value the business below $20 billion, the WSJ sources said.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 29 2020, @04:04PM (1 child)
Nope.
The CEO shows he's the genius by getting others to come up with different plans and have them thrash it out amongst themselves. The CEO "picks" the winner (after others have solved the problems). There's a definite skill in being able to manage a group of ambitious pricks without becoming an ambitious prick yourself. Try it one day - get into a debate with some people and try to avoid being the one cramming your solution down everyone else's throat.
I'd say that is the main skill.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Sunday August 30 2020, @01:25AM
That's some interesting good wisdom there. Only thing I'll comment: the dynamic is (quite) different when you're the boss and have the power and authority to make the decisions, shut people down, fire them, etc. But again, excellent points.