Buying HBO Was the Easy Part for AT&T
It's been three years since CEO Randall Stephenson set his sights on the Hollywood business. Being a media mogul is harder than it looks.
Three years ago this month, Hollywood executive Peter Chernin and AT&T Inc. CEO Randall Stephenson shared a dinner on Martha’s Vineyard. Stephenson is still waiting for his dessert to arrive.
It was the meal that sparked the idea for Stephenson, a practically lifelong member of the staid telephone industry, to enter the TV and film business by acquiring Time Warner, a then-$60 billion giant of the media world. After Stephenson struck the deal, he told Bloomberg News that it was Chernin who “first got me to appreciate the library that this company owns.” That library includes HBO, with hits like “Game of Thrones” and “Succession;” the Warner Bros. studio, which that year had an almost 17% share of the box office; and the rights to “Friends,” a sitcom that hasn’t aired fresh episodes in more than 15 years but has taken on new life as the Holy Grail of the streaming-TV market.