Iger
Continuing a companywide push toward digital distribution, ABC will start offering episodes of many of its shows on its own Web site for free, with ads later this year.
News was confirmed by Disney CEO Bob Iger in a presentation to analysts at the Bear Stearns conference, where he emphasized the digital possibilities of what he sees as conglom's three core brands: Disney, ABC and ESPN.
Though Iger didn't reveal details on when the Net service, called MyABC, will launch, and what shows will be offered in what time frame relative to broadcast, move is clearly a significant one. Exec did say ABC will sell new ads for the service rather than repurpose spots from broadcast.
While many nets have Webcast individual episodes of their shows online for promotional purposes, none have yet regularly Webcast series for free -- a move sure to raise affiliates' eyebrows.
But Iger made clear that maintaining current business relationships isn't at the top of his agenda. "You have to be willing to put traditional business models and relationships aside in order to reach consumers," he noted. "We will no longer be slave to the old business models because consumers just don't care about them."
Exec made that clear in October, when ABC and its cable sibs became the first nets to start selling shows through iTunes. Iger revealed that the Alphabet has sold more than 3 million downloads through iTunes since then, which is about $6 million in gross revenue (of which ABC is believed to get about $4.2 million).
Asked about the conglom's $7.2 billion acquisition of Pixar, Iger re-emphasized the importance of animation and acknowledged that the Mouse House has recently fallen behind in the space.
"We had 10 years of failure in many respects in a business I believe is most vital to us," Iger admitted. "We considered options for how we could turn things around fast ... I felt buying (Pixar) could turn Disney animation around immediately in a lot of different ways."
CEO added that in addition to one feature per year from Pixar and Disney's own animation unit, studio expects to release a sequel to past Pixar properties every other year. While Disney previously started work on "Toy Story 3" inhouse, those sequels are expected to be produced, or at least overseen, by Pixar following the acquisition.
Iger also emphasized, as he has in the past, that the Mouse House is cutting back on live-action feature film production and focusing more on Disney-branded family films.
"If you look at returns on investment in the live-action movie business, it's substantially better for Disney branded than non-Disney branded," Iger observed. "We have been reallocating capital in the movie business to the Disney brand, and you're going to probably see that continue in a quicker, more profound way."
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