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For Disney’s board, a meticulous CEO handoff — not ‘a rigged game’ — was the imperative

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For Disney’s board, a meticulous CEO handoff — not ‘a rigged game’ — was the imperative

Casual conversation in Hollywood often drifted to a familiar question: “Will Bob extend his contract again?”

Walt Disney Co.’s board had initially set Chief Executive Bob Iger’s target retirement date for 2015. The board instead renewed his contract multiple times, then called him back in 2022 — nearly a year after he had retired — when the last leadership handoff famously unraveled.

Disney’s struggles with succession over the decades have become epic dramas filled with false starts, larger-than-life leaders reticent to go and allegations of hollow searches for a new CEO. Twenty-plus years ago, one candidate for the top job — former Ebay and Hewlett-Packard chief Meg Whitman — withdrew from the running, suggesting the fix was in.

Disney’s board at the time wanted to give Iger, a longtime ABC executive who had toiled years in the shadow of former Chief Executive Michael Eisner, a shot.

With all that history, Disney’s board recognized its imperative of choreographing a meticulous transition. Iger, 74, was ready to go, and the process to find his successor was certain to go under the microscope.

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“We had to be open — we couldn’t be questioned on it,” Disney Chairman James Gorman told The Times in an interview to shed light on what, until this week, had been a closely guarded boardroom process. “We didn’t just want to have this as a rigged game.”

This week, Disney’s board unanimously approved the selection of 54-year-old parks chief Josh D’Amaro to succeed Iger on March 18 when the company holds its annual meeting with shareholders. The switch will mark the end of an era, as Iger has been a towering presence in Hollywood for more than 20 years.

Two years of planning led up to D’Amaro’s selection. When Iger’s last successor, Bob Chapek, was ousted in November 2022, Disney’s board announced that Iger would return to serve as CEO for just two years.

But a series of high-level executive departures had thinned Disney’s executive bench. The board later acknowledged it needed additional time to plan succession and Iger’s contract was extended again, this time to December 2026.

Disney Chairman James Gorman, former chairman of Morgan Stanley, led the succession search that culminated this week.

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(Hollie Adams / Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Gorman — a former chairman and chief executive of Morgan Stanley — joined Disney’s board in the fall of 2024. He became chairman in January 2025 and succession planning began in earnest. Unlike in early 2020, when Iger was in charge of the board that tapped Chapek, this time the board formed a succession committee comprised of current and former CEOs of different firms.

The committee, led by Gorman, included General Motors Chief Executive Mary Barra, former CEO of Lululemon Athletica Calvin McDonald; and the former head of Britain’s Sky broadcasting, Sir Jeremy Darroch.

The search began with a list of about 100 potential candidates, Gorman said, including names provided by search firm Heidrick & Struggles. The group eventually culled the list to 30, he said, then narrowed it even more. They met with a few outsiders.

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“We wanted to see what was out there … but it’s always difficult to go outside for any company,” Gorman said, adding that typically happens during a crisis, such as an abrupt CEO retirement due to illness or some other unforeseen event.

“You don’t take somebody from the industrials world and plop them in a media company,” he said. “That’s just too big a lift.”

Increasing the challenge, the 102-year-old company has a distinct corporate culture — one that still pays homage to founder Walt and instills in its employees (known internally as cast members) the need to serve as guardians of Disney’s treasured characters and brands.

Any outside pick would have been a risky bet.

Four Disney executives were under evaluation. D’Amaro, television and streaming chief Dana Walden, movie chief Alan Bergman and ESPN Chairman Jimmy Pitaro were all viewed as contenders for the job.

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The board spent months sizing up strengths and weaknesses of external and internal candidates. Candidates made presentations to the board, laid out their visions for Disney’s future, received mentoring from Iger and spent hours meeting with Gorman and other succession committee members as well as the full board.

Hopefuls were questioned on their visions for the company. They were quizzed about such topics as teamwork and corporate culture.

“We wanted to know that whomever we picked beat all comers,” Gorman said. “And our people stress-tested unbelievably well. Yes, the [Disney executives] were given a huge advantage because they understand the culture, it’s a very unique culture, but it wasn’t just that.

“They were capable and they were ready,” Gorman said.

The board increasingly became comfortable with D’Amaro — who joined the company 28 years ago in Disneyland’s accounting division. For the past six years, D’Amaro has run Disney’s parks and experiences division, which now is the company’s largest business unit amid the decline of traditional television.

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Dana Walden and Josh D'Amaro.

Walt Disney Co.’s board named Josh D’Amaro, right, as the new chief executive. Dana Walden, left, who is co-chairman of Disney Entertainment, will step into the role as president and chief creative officer.

(Walt Disney Company)

The board also carved out a new role as president and chief creative officer for longtime television executive Walden, 61, who becomes the first woman to serve as Disney’s president.

Gorman said Walden, 61, was impressive.

“She’s a strong leader. She’s decisive. She’s got great creative chops,” Gorman said. “She’s worked well with Alan Bergman as co-chair of entertainment. The idea is to ensure we bring creativity to all parts of the company and in all corners of the world.”

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“A new CEO is massively, positively enabled by having their team, if they’re capable,” Gorman said. “And we are blessed with [our team] in place.”

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Older AC and fridge chemicals amp up climate change. Trump just rolled back limits on them

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Older AC and fridge chemicals amp up climate change. Trump just rolled back limits on them

President Trump on Thursday announced that grocery stories and air conditioning companies will be allowed to keep using high-polluting refrigerants for longer than they would have under a law he signed during his first administration.

“This was a tremendous burden, a tremendous cost,” said Trump, surrounded in the Oval Office by executives from supermarket chains including Kroger, Fairway, Neimann Foods and Piggly Wiggly. “It was making the equipment unaffordable, and the actual benefit was nothing.”

The move loosens rules meant to restrict hydroflourocarbons, a class of climate-damaging chemicals used in cooling equipment. HFCs are known as “super pollutants” because their impact on climate change can be tens of thousands of times greater than carbon dioxide during their shorter lifespans.

In the move Thursday, the Environmental Protection Agency extends the deadline for companies to comply with a 2023 rule transitioning refrigerators and air conditioners off HFCs and onto new cooling technologies. Reducing these chemicals and moving to cleaner refrigerants has long been a bipartisan issue.

Trump is also proposing exemptions from a rule requiring leak repairs on large-scale refrigeration systems.

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The administration framed the changes as part of its effort to bring down high grocery costs. EPA administrator Lee Zeldin said the actions will save $2.4 billion for Americans and safeguard 350,000 jobs.

“Americans who wanted to be able to fix their equipment were instead being required to buy far more costly new equipment and that just doesn’t make any sense,” said Zeldin.

David Doniger, senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the move will not only harm the climate, but U.S. competitiveness in global refrigerant markets as well.

“The EPA is catering to a small group of straggling companies by derailing the shift away from these climate super-pollutants,” he said. “The industry at large supports the HFC phasedown and has already invested in making new refrigerants and equipment, currently installed in thousands of stores.”

Danielle Wright, executive director of the North American Sustainable Refrigeration Council, an environmental nonprofit, said any perceived near-term savings from the rollbacks will be outweighed by the future costs.

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“Business owners are far more worried about the escalating cost of keeping aging, high‑global-warming-potential equipment running than they are about the cost of installing new, compliant systems,” she said.

Trump dismissed the climate concerns, saying his changes “are not going to have any impact on the environment.”

He said he wants to get rid of the technology transition rule entirely in the future.

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Airbnb to add grocery delivery and car rentals ahead of World Cup

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Airbnb to add grocery delivery and car rentals ahead of World Cup

Airbnb unveiled a new set of services for guests on Wednesday, adding car rentals, airport pickup and grocery delivery to its online marketplace that connects travelers with local hosts.

Customers can now get groceries delivered to their Airbnb through a partnership with Instacart and have a driver meet them at the airport with Airbnb’s Welcome Pickups. The app is also offering luggage storage in partnership with Bounce and will add in-app car rentals later this summer.

At the same time, Airbnb is ramping up its use of AI by adding AI-powered review summaries and lodging comparisons, the company said.

The company has been expanding beyond lodging since last year, when it introduced Airbnb Experiences and Services, giving guests the option to book private tours and chef-cooked meals through the app.

In an earnings call earlier this month, the company’s chief executive, Brian Chesky, said the company is at “the very, very beginning of how AI is going to change how we all do our jobs.”

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The changes are coming in time for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, which will take place in 16 cities across the U.S., Mexico and Canada. The company said its offering exclusive World Cup experiences, such as watch parties and access to stadiums.

“In terms of what we’ve seen in cumulative bookings heading into the event, the World Cup is slated to be the largest event in Airbnb’s history,” said the company’s chief financial officer, Ellie Mertz, on the earnings call.

Airbnb gained popularity for offering travelers unique and homey stays on other people’s property, but it added boutique hotel bookings to its platform late last year. The move had some customers questioning if the app was straying too far from its original purpose.

In its announcement this week, the company said it is partnering with more independent hotels in 20 top destinations, including New York, London and Singapore. On the earnings call, Chesky said hotels on Airbnb could become a multibillion-dollar revenue business.

The San Francisco-based company was founded in 2007 and gave homeowners the opportunity to earn money by renting out their space to travelers seeking something different from a hotel. Airbnb bookings can range from private bedrooms in a shared home to luxury mansions and yachts.

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The company’s revenue grew 18% year over year to $2.7 billion in the first quarter, while net income increased slightly to $160 million. Airbnb’s new services and offerings could transform it from a home-sharing platform to a holistic travel marketplace, analysts said.

Shares of the company have increased by 14% over the past six months and fell by less than 1% on Thursday.

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SpaceX files to go public in huge IPO deal

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SpaceX files to go public in huge IPO deal

Elon Musk wants to take investors on a ride to the moon — and beyond.

His pioneering rocket company SpaceX filed Wednesday for what’s expected to be the largest initial public offering in history, potentially raising at least $75 billion and valuing the company at as much as $2 trillion.

The registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission for an expected public offering next month explicitly sets aside stocks for retail investors, though the exact number will be spelled out in a later filing, as will the offering price and company valuation.

Interest in the stock offering is expected to be high despite the billionaire’s controversial politics, including his involvement last year with the Department of Government Efficiency, the makeshift cost-cutting effort that resulted in the loss of hundreds of thousands of government jobs.

“Potential investors are probably just as polarized as the electorate is too, given his dabbling in politics,” said Carol Schleif, chief market strategist for BMO Private Wealth. “But it’s not just the SpaceX IPO per se, it’s a bigger, broader excitement among investors for space investment in general.”

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Investor interest was piqued by the Artemis II moon mission this year that SpaceX did not participate in, she said. However, the company is expected to play a larger role in future missions that take astronauts to the moon..

Ultimately, Musk, 54, wants to establish a colony on Mars but those plans have been set on the back burner, with NASA now focusing on moon missions.

Musk will remain the company’s chief executive and chairman. Under a dual-class stock structure as a holder of special Class B shares he will be able to control the election of directors, the filing says.

The IPO is expected to be at least twice as large as the current record holder: Saudi Aramco, the state-controlled national oil and gas company of Saudi Arabia, which raised nearly $30 billion in 2019.

Nearly two dozen banks will be underwriting the IPO and offering shares to investors, including Goldman Sachs, Bank of America and Citigroup.

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Founded in 2002 in El Segundo, SpaceX has revolutionized the aerospace industry by developing the reusable Falcon 9 rocket that has radically lowered launch costs.

The company moved its headquarters from Hawthorne to Texas in 2024. However, SpaceX retains large operations in the South Bay city and blasts off regularly from Vandenberg Space Force Base in Santa Barbara County.

Scores of former SpaceX employees have launched startups in Southern California, including rocket company Relativity Space, hypersonic missile startup Castelion and satellite manufacturer Apex Space.

Since developing its reusable rocket technology, SpaceX has established its Starlink network as the leading satellite-based broadband internet service. It also is moving into satellite-based cellular service and this year merged with Musk’s xAi artificial intelligence company that also included his X social network.

Marco Cáceres, an aerospace analyst at Teal Group, said that the advantage of going public for SpaceX lies in the IPO’s ability to raise a large amount of capital quickly to complete development of its Starship rocket.

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“It is going to dominate the market even more than the Falcon 9 is dominating the market now,” he said. “That’s going to be ultimately what’s going to drive their business for the next 10 years.”

The 12th test launch of Starship is set for Friday from the company’s south Texas launch facility. The rocket is the third version of craft, standing more than 400 feet tall and with about three times the payload of the second version.

The regulatory filing claims that the market for its rocket, internet and mobile telephone businesses could be as large as $28.5 trillion.

SpaceX also plans to launch thousands of orbiting data centers powered by the sun that would perform AI calculations.

With the company making massive capital investments, it recorded a $4.28-billion loss in the first quarter. Last year, it recorded $18.7 billion in revenue and lost $4.94 billion, according to the filing.

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The public offering is expected to hit the market next month after a “road show,” during which SpaceX will seek to drum up interest from institutional and retail investors.

It will arrive after a fairly quiet year for IPOs that was brightened last week when Cerebras Systems, a Sunnyvale company that makes semiconductors for AI supercomputers, went public.

Shares at Cerebras were offered at $185 and jumped 68% on its opening day. They closed Wednesday at $290.69.

Matt Kennedy, a senior strategist at Renaissance Capital, said the SpaceX offering would dwarf that of Cerebras, as it is expected to raise more than every IPO combined in the last two years.

“A win here or a loss could really impact the IPO market,” he said. “The sheer size of this deal is going to make or lose fortunes.”

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Among the oddest disclosures of the IPO is a decision by the company’s board in January to grant Musk 1 billion Class B shares if the company reaches a certain market capitalization and establishes a “permanent human colony on Mars with at least one million inhabitants.”

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