The Flywheel is strong with this one. We dive deep into the origins of one of the boldest business strategy decisions of our time: Disney CEO Bob Iger’s attempt to buck the Innovator’s Dilemma - and forego billions of dollars in cashflow from Netflix and pay TV providers - in order to establish a direct distribution relationship with its customers for the first time in the company’s history. Is this the force awakening within the house that Walt built, or a phantom menace that will drag Disney to the dark side of unprofitability? Tune in to find out!

Sponsors:

Anthropic: https://bit.ly/acquiredclaude25
ServiceNow: https://bit.ly/acquiredsn
Vanta: http://vanta.com/acquired
Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig25

More Acquired!

• Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes
• Join the Slack
• Subscribe to ACQ2
• Merch Store!

© Copyright 2015-2025 ACQ, LLC

Links:

•  https://www.thewaltdisneycompany.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/2018-Annual-Report.pdf
•  https://www.thewaltdisneycompany.com/wp-content/uploads/q4-fy17-earnings-transcript.pdf
•  https://www.thewaltdisneycompany.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/q4-fy19-earnings.pdf
• The Disney flywheel:  https://kottke.org/15/06/walt-disneys-corporate-strategy-chart 
• 
  

Sources: 

• The Ride of a Lifetime by Bob Iger:  https://www.amazon.com/Ride-Lifetime-Lessons-Learned-Company-ebook/dp/B07PF6XTD8
•  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/22/style/disney-bob-iger-book.html
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Iger
•  https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/features/bob-iger-bets-company-hollywood-s-future-streaming-1247663 
•  https://www.wsj.com/articles/can-kevin-mayer-deliver-the-future-of-disney-11573272027 
•  https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-11-07/inside-disney-bob-iger-on-star-wars-pixar-and-more 
•  https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bob-iger-the-ride-of-a-lifetime/id1264843400?i=1000451721143  

Carveouts: 

• David: The Ride of a Lifetime
• Ben: The Imagineering Story on Disney+:  https://www.disneyplus.com/series/the-imagineering-story/6ryoXv1e1rWW