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Zaz in Cable Wonderland

At first blush, WBD’s chief seems to be following Brian Roberts’ “SpinCo” strategy for his own declining linear assets. But a closer look at the sheer legal and M&A firepower he’s enlisted reveals a debt-reduction/P.E. play that more closely resembles AT&T’s sale of DirecTV.

David Zaslav
With the reorg, Zaz has made clear he’ll do what’s necessary to reduce the sting of his declining linear TV business and get WBD a much-desired credit-rating upgrade. Photo: Christopher Polk/Variety/Getty Images
William D. Cohan
December 15, 2024

Our friend David Zaslav appears to be on the verge of following the same strategic path that his frenemy Brian Roberts announced some two weeks ago, when Comcast declared that it was spinning off its cable television assets, including both MSNBC and CNBC—but not NBC proper or, notably, Bravo—into a new, separate, “well-capitalized” company, a process that will take well into 2025 to accomplish. On Thursday morning, Zaz took the first steps toward following in Comcast’s footsteps.