In what is seen as an effort to make Hulu a little more nimble as change in the market accelerates, the company is expected to trim the size of its board, with Disney CEO Bob Iger and News Corp. COO Chase Carey stepping down.
The Wall Street Journal said the board, which includes had included three directors from each of the joint venture's owner, Disney, News Corp. and NBC Universal (until the acquisition by Comcast when they stepped down), and two from Providence Equity Partners, could see additional cuts soon. The three media companies have often gone toe-to-toe on a number of critical decisions. That's caused CEO Jason Kilar headaches as he tries to position the company to compete in a market that has become more fragmented as additional players have entered and as his partner-owners pick up their own efforts to monetize online video, putting more content online and making deals of their own with Hulu competitors, ala NBCU and Netflix.
If Iger and Carey, two of the most powerful media execs in Hollywood, leave the board, Kilar would have more room to mold the company into what he wants it to be, including setting pricing for Hulu Plus, expanding content deals and looking for additional means of delivery.
Last month, Kilar ruffled feathers among his partners when he posted a long blog about the future of television, a blog that cast the TV model in a less-than-flattering light. He said, for example, that TV wasn't flexible enough, didn't fit into viewers lives and gave advertisers a poor return for their ad dollars.
A slimmed-down board may just give him a little more room to operate.
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