Disney CFO Hugh Johnston and UBS analyst John Hodulik. Photo: Kerry Flynn/Axios
Expect a friendlier M&A environment in the Trump administration, Andrew Lipman of Morgan, Lewis & Bockius said on Monday at the UBS Global Media and Communications Conference.
Here's what else we heard:
Comcast Connectivity and Platforms CEO Dave Watson shares Q4's expected broadband losses and ARPU
- "In Q4, the hurricanes, we think will impact to the tune of around 10,000 broadband losses, and there'll be a slight impact to ARPU. So when you add all these things together and you look at it going into Q4 ... we could be looking at a broadband subscriber loss in Q4 of just over 100,000. ... The ARPU range that we've talked about at 3% to 4%, we'll be at the lower end of that range."
Fox Corp CFO Steve Tomsic and Disney CFO Hugh Johnston, separately, chat purpose of Venu
- "I think our participation in Venu is a signal of how we view, sort of have capacity to deal outside of the bundle. What we don't want to do is just create another 'me too' of the bundle and compete with what is out there," Tomsic said.
- "ESPN strategy is to sort of meet the fan where they want to be met. And for a subset of sports fans, they don't necessarily need to have 100% of sports, but they'd like to have something more than just ESPN. That was the concept behind behind Venu," Johnston said.
Roku CFO Dan Jedda touts first-mover advantage, scale and partnerships amid competition from Vizio, Amazon, The Trade Desk and others
- "We have a great relationship with Walmart. Our streamers love our products. They ask for Roku by name. And so I do not believe that [the Vizio acquisition] will particularly impact us."
- "We have been in this space for 15 years. They've always had checkbooks. When I was at Amazon, they had a big checkbook as well. And you can't diminish being No. 1 in this space because it's the position you want to be in and it's a position of strength."
TKO Group president and COO Mark Shapiro eyeing growth of Professional Bull Riders and future bet on boxing
- "We've made no secret of our desire to get our arms around leagues where we can continue to own, holistically, all the spokes and monetize all the spokes inside of the larger TKO ecosystem. And PBR just has a lot of low-hanging fruit."
- "We've got a lot to integrate right now. We're not on the hunt. ... Boxing is something we would do organically, so nothing to buy, just something we'd start up and likely take a partner in the Middle East that would serve as an investment partner for us."
