Byron Allen Wants to Buy ABC, But Says Disney ‘Not Ready’

Paging Bob Iger, your party is waiting for you at the negotiating table! That party is billionaire Byron Allen, who owns Allen Media Group and has reportedly lodged a $10 billion bid to purchase ABC, FX, and the National Geographic channel from Disney.

Disney is expected to part ways with at least some of these channels in the coming years, to better focus its entertainment efforts on its streamers Disney+ and Hulu. The company could also use the proceeds of these sales to help establish a streaming version of the ESPN suite of channels sometime before 2026.

But according to Allen, Disney isn’t quite ready to pull the trigger on any deals yet. He spoke to CNBC this week at the Code Conference, and said that bringing together the money to make a purchase happen won’t be an issue and that when the time comes he has a step-by-step plan for buying ABC ready to go.

The problem is that Disney and its CEO Iger are “not yet ready” to proceed with a sale, in Allen’s words. He gave a fantastic analogy on just how difficult Disney’s pivot to streaming is to execute, especially after relying on the cable subscription model for so many years.

“These legacy companies are trying to reinvent themselves,” Allen said. “It’s like they’re trying to build a new airplane mid-air while they’re flying their old airplane, in a publicly traded entity. This is a very challenging thing to accomplish. Bob is excellent at what he does, he’s phenomenal, he’s the best person to do it, but whoa, they’re asking him to do something that has not occurred in the last 100 years.”

There has been skepticism from some in the industry that Disney will be able to offload ABC in the current market. Conjecture that a sale could be imminent erupted when it was reported Disney had held conversations with Nexstar about an ABC deal, but some with knowledge of the situation threw cold water on the idea that ABC would be on the move very soon.

One banker recently commented “Disney taking a meeting [regarding selling ABC] doesn’t mean [they’re] ready to sell, it means [they’re] getting offers. This is something evolving over many weeks.”

Some believe that Disney could be in line to receive $7 to $8 billion for ABC alone, so Allen may have to up his offer when negotiations begin in earnest. But there’s no doubting his enthusiasm, as he told CNBC he’d pursue ABC “like a lion chasing a gazelle” when the time comes.

He also pointed out he would be in a better position to buy ABC than a company like Nexstar, the largest owner of local broadcast affiliates in the country. Nexstar is already bumping up against the law that stipulates broadcasters cannot reach more than 39% of American households, and is in fact being sued by DIRECTV for allegedly trying to skirt this law. Allen Media Group would face no such regulatory concerns.

Allen made serious inquiries into purchasing BET and BET+ from Paramount earlier this year, so it’s clear the media mogul is acquisition-minded. Now, he just needs Disney and its CEO Bob Iger to make their way to the negotiating table so he can present his best argument for buying ABC.