MADRID, 30 Mar. (EUROPA PRESS) –
US entertainment giant Walt Disney Company has fired Isaac Perlmutter, president of Marvel Entertainment, as part of a cost-cutting campaign.
The company informed Perlmutter, 80, on Wednesday that Marvel Entertainment, which was in charge of selling comics and related consumer products, “was redundant” and that it will be integrated into another larger business unit at Disney. , as reported by the newspaper ‘The New York Times’.
Perlmutter, who often clashed with other executives internally, was Marvel’s chief executive and largest shareholder when Disney acquired the company in 2009 for about $4 billion.
The businessman, who still owns a sizeable chunk of Disney stock, has been seen as a distraction within the company, especially since he teamed up with investor Nelson Peltz to join the board of directors. When he was rejected, he launched a proxy battle to get on the board, claiming he would cut costs and “clean up the mess” of succession planning.
This announcement comes after the company announced at the beginning of February the execution of a cut of 7,000 employees, which represents 3.6 percent of its workforce, in an effort to improve profit margins, with the aim of saving 5,500 million dollars (5,070 million euros) in costs.
As part of the change, the company’s CEO, Bob Iger, detailed that the company would be reorganized into three divisions: an entertainment unit that includes its main film and television businesses, the sports networks ESPN and the theme parks unit, which includes cruise ships and product stores.
The cuts respond to the losses registered by the company in its streaming services due to the loss of users, which have doubled in 2022 compared to 2021, with an amount that amounts to 1,050 million dollars (979 million euros), according to Bloomberg.
Disney is the latest of the big streaming content companies to announce downsizing in response to slowing subscriber growth and increased competition for viewers.
