Bob Iger

• 1. Introduction

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  Bob Iger started his career earning $150 a week doing menial labor on television sets. Decades later, he would oversee a company whose market capitalization grew from $56 billion to $231 billion. That arc, from entry-level grunt work to one of the most powerful seats in global entertainment, raises a question worth sitting with: what does it actually take to run the Walt Disney Company, not once, but twice?

  Iger led Disney through four of the largest acquisitions in media history. He opened theme parks in East Asia, launched a streaming service that would upend Hollywood, and returned to the CEO chair after a retirement he never quite completed. But the story of how he got there, and what he did with that power, is more complicated than any highlight reel suggests.

• 2. From Ithaca to ABC

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  Robert Alan Iger was born on the 10th of February 1951 in New York City, into an Austrian-Jewish family. His father, Arthur L. Iger, was a World War II Navy veteran who became executive vice president and general manager of the Greenvale Marketing Corporation, and also taught advertising and public relations. His mother worked at Boardman Junior High School in Oceanside, New York, where Iger grew up and graduated from Oceanside High School in 1969.

  He enrolled at Ithaca College and graduated magna cum laude in 1973 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Television and Radio from the School of Communications. His first media job came the year before graduation: hosting Campus Probe, an Ithaca College television show. He briefly dreamed of becoming a news anchor and worked as a weatherman in Ithaca for five months before changing direction.

  In 1974, Iger joined ABC. For several years he worked his way through the ranks, and by 1988 he was the senior program executive for the Calgary Winter Olympics. The event was plagued by disruptive weather and delayed competition, and Iger's team turned to human interest stories to fill airtime, including segments on the Jamaican bobsled team and British ski jumper Eddie the Eagle. ABC recorded its highest-ever ratings for a Winter Games that year, and the performance caught the attention of two ABC executives, Daniel Burke and Thomas Murphy, who became Iger's advocates as he moved up the organization.

  In 1989, Iger was named head of ABC Entertainment, where he green-lit shows including Twin Peaks, America's Funniest Home Videos, and Cop Rock. He held a series of escalating titles through the early 1990s, and by 1994 was named president and chief operating officer of Capital Cities/ABC, ABC's corporate parent.

• 3. Inheriting the Kingdom

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  Disney acquired Capital Cities/ABC in 1995, and Iger stayed on. On the 25th of February 1999, Disney moved Iger to lead Walt Disney International and chair the ABC Group, which the company characterized as a promotion even as it removed him from day-to-day authority at the network. On the 24th of January 2000, Disney named him president and chief operating officer, making him the No. 2 executive under chairman and CEO Michael Eisner.

  Eisner's grip on Disney had grown contested. In 2003, board members Roy E. Disney and Stanley Gold launched a campaign they called "Save Disney" against Eisner, pressuring the company to identify a successor. On the 13th of March 2005, Disney announced that Iger would take over as CEO. Eisner formally held the title until he resigned on the 30th of September 2005. That July, Disney and Gold dropped the campaign and agreed to work with Iger.

  One of Iger's early moves was to dismantle the company's Strategic Planning division and reassign its chief strategic officer, Peter Murphy. It was also around this time that the executive who had long gone by Robert began to be known simply as Bob.

• 4. The Acquisition Era

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  On the 24th of January 2006, Disney announced it would purchase Pixar for $7.4 billion in an all-stock transaction, giving the company ownership of the studio behind some of the most successful animated films of the era. That same year, Iger also re-acquired the rights to Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, Walt Disney's first star, from NBCUniversal. The currency for that deal was unusual: Iger released sportscaster Al Michaels from ABC Sports to NBC Sports in exchange.

  In August 2009, Iger negotiated the acquisition of Marvel Entertainment and its associated intellectual properties for $4 billion. By 2014, Disney had earned back more than that amount at the box office through Marvel films alone. In October 2012, Iger struck a deal with filmmaker George Lucas to buy Lucasfilm for $4 billion, bringing the Star Wars multimedia franchise and Indiana Jones under the Disney umbrella.

  The largest deal came in 2019, when Disney finalized the purchase of the entertainment assets of 21st Century Fox for $71.3 billion, after shareholders from both companies approved the transaction in July 2018. Across his initial tenure, Iger grew Disney's market capitalization from $56 billion to $231 billion.

  Beyond acquisitions, Iger pushed Disney's physical footprint eastward. Hong Kong Disneyland Resort opened in 2005, and in March 2016 Iger announced the opening of the $5.5 billion Shanghai Disney Resort later that year.

• 5. Streaming and the Exit

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  Iger positioned Disney heavily into direct-to-consumer media, backing the development of Disney+ and expanding the company's stake in Hulu. On the 10th of September 2019, he resigned from Apple's board of directors to avoid a conflict of interest as Disney and Apple prepared to launch competing streaming services.

  Also in September 2019, Iger published his memoir, The Ride of a Lifetime. His contract as chairman and CEO had originally been set to expire on the 30th of June 2018; it was extended to July 2019, then through 2021, before he announced plans to retire.

  On the 25th of February 2020, Disney's board named Bob Chapek, then-chairman of Disney Parks, Experiences and Products, as the new CEO. Iger became executive chairman to oversee the transition. The COVID-19 pandemic prompted the board to unexpectedly extend Iger's mandate through the end of 2021. On the 31st of December 2021, Iger formally stepped down, with Susan Arnold succeeding him as chair of the board.

  On the 20th of November 2022, Disney's board dismissed Chapek and reinstated Iger as CEO. Iger agreed to hold the post for two years while identifying a successor. On the 12th of July 2023, Disney extended his contract through the end of 2026. His 2023 compensation totaled $31.6 million, which included a base salary of $865,385, stock awards of $16.1 million, $10 million in stock option awards, $2.1 million in performance-based compensation, and $2.48 million in other compensation.

  During his second tenure, Disney's share price increased 22%, compared with 68% for the S&P 500 over the same period. In January 2026, Iger announced he intended to leave before his contract ended. He officially stepped down as CEO at the company's annual meeting on the 18th of March 2026, succeeded by Josh D'Amaro, while remaining a senior advisor and board member through the end of that year.

• 6. Controversies and Criticism

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  In November 2017, a trade publication reported that Iger had known about a 2010 Oscar party at which Pixar chief John Lasseter was seen making out with a junior staffer. An anonymous source was quoted directly: "I know personally that Bob was aware. Everybody was aware. They just didn't do anything about it." The reporting linked Iger to awareness of Lasseter's behavior toward young women that dated back to the 1990s.

  In August 2019, actress Paz de la Huerta added Iger to her lawsuit against Harvey Weinstein, claiming that Iger and former CEO Michael Eisner had made decisions that allowed Weinstein to harm employees during his run at Miramax from 1993 to 2005. Disney denied any knowledge of misconduct or settlements with victims.

  During a July 2023 interview on CNBC, Iger called the Writers Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA strikes "not realistic" and described the unions as adding to challenges the industry was "quite frankly, very disruptive" in already facing. The remarks drew widespread criticism as tone-deaf, with observers pointing to the $27 million annual salary he received upon rejoining Disney.

  In December 2024, Iger approved a $16 million settlement with Donald Trump over a lawsuit Trump had filed against ABC News. Critics characterized the settlement as a threat to press freedom. Then, between the 17th and the 22nd of September 2025, Disney-owned ABC indefinitely suspended Jimmy Kimmel Live! following pressure from the second Trump administration and right-wing media. According to a trade publication, Iger made the decision jointly with Dana Walden. Michael Eisner publicly condemned the move on social media, writing "Where has all the leadership gone?" Kimmel was later allowed to return to the air.

• 7. Life Beyond the Studio

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  Iger's father, Arthur, died in 2010; his mother, Mimi, died in 2013. His first marriage, to Kathleen Susan Iger, ended in divorce; they have two daughters. In 1995, Iger married journalist Willow Bay in an interfaith Jewish and Roman Catholic ceremony in Bridgehampton, New York.

  On the 15th of November 2011, Apple named Iger to its board of directors. He had been reportedly responsible for making Steve Jobs Disney's largest individual shareholder after the all-stock Pixar acquisition. In October 2020, Iger became a director of dairy-replacement startup Perfect Day. He joined the board of Genies, Inc. in March 2022.

  In July 2024, Iger and Willow Bay agreed to acquire a majority stake in Angel City FC, a Los Angeles-based National Women's Soccer League team, with a $100 million investment. To manage potential conflicts of interest, Iger agreed to recuse himself from all Disney and ESPN business matters related to women's soccer.

  Iger described himself as a centrist and formerly identified with the Democratic Party, switching his registration to independent in 2016. He co-chaired a fundraiser for Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign on the 22nd of August 2016, then accepted a place on President-elect Trump's Strategic and Policy Forum on the 2nd of December 2016. He resigned from that forum on the 1st of June 2017 after President Trump withdrew the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement. Iger had at various points considered a presidential run as a Democrat but ultimately chose not to pursue it.

  In December 2019, Time named him Businessperson of the Year. In September 2022, Queen Elizabeth II appointed Iger an Honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire for services to UK-US relations. In October 2024, French President Emmanuel Macron awarded him the title of Chevalier de la Legion d'honneur for his service to France. He also voiced the character of weather forecaster Bob Tiger in Disney Animation's 2025 film Zootopia 2, a credit that places him, after a career spanning more than five decades in media, inside the very storytelling world he spent his tenure building.