Media moguls and executives at Sun Valley spend a lot of time talking about how to best prepare for the challenges of Web and mobile disruption in the 21st Century.
Companies that once traded and leveraged their huge size and scale of distribution are now considering whether just being bigger might not necessarily be better in the new fragmented media world.
For example, Time Warner Inc is slimming down by spinning off its Time Warner Cable unit and AOL, its Internet division. It may also look to rid itself of its Time Inc publishing unit.
“The notion that there are synergies between content and distribution has been dispelled,” says Tuna Amobi, an equity analyst at Standard & Poor’s. “You’re not going to see a Comcast Corp trying to merge with a Disney anymore.”
Not everyone agrees. Sony Corp remains one of the world’s largest companies with major interests in a global empire that spans music, movies, video games, software, mobile phones and consumer electronics.
Tom Hanks and Sony CEO Howard Stringer might just have gained a little street cred with the tech crowd this week.
