Comcast’s chief financial officer Michael Angelakis is stepping down from his role to lead a new strategic start-up that will invest in and operate “growth-orientated companies, both domestically and internationally”.
There was no mention of the…
Comcast’s chief financial officer Michael Angelakis is stepping down from his role to lead a new strategic start-up that will invest in and operate “growth-orientated companies, both domestically and internationally”.
There was no mention of the direction the new company would go in, but Comcast has committed US$4bn to the entrepreneurial venture and Angelakis is putting US$40m of his fortune into it.
Angelakis will be CEO of the new business, which will have an exclusive, 10-year partnership with Comcast as sole outside investor.
Comcast said Angelakis now had “a mandate and the resources to pursue new areas of growth and diversification” for the company.
Brian Roberts, CEO and chairman of Comcast, said: “This is a time of tremendous change and opportunity in our core technology and media industries, as well as in adjacent business areas.
“We believe the ability to establish entrepreneurial ventures that partner with and participate in the growth of innovative companies can be an important driver of strategic and financial value creation for our company.”
Comcast, awaiting regulatory approval of its game-changing takeover of Time Warner Cable, has begun the search for a new CFO.
In a memo to investors right after the announcement, Wells Fargo analyst Marci Ryvicker said she did not believe the new vehicle would necessarily mean a change in Comcast’s M&A strategy.
She instead suggested it was a “well thought out personal decision by Mr Angelakis that both satisfies his entrepreneurial nature and Comcast’s desire for growth.”
Ryvicker added that she did not think the venture had a particular path in mind for now as it sounded “very nascent in nature”.
