Word: tisch
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Diller wasn't furious at the Robertses, others were mad enough at the family to make up for the omission. "Hollywood couldn't have written a script like this," snapped a source close to CBS chairman Laurence Tisch. "All these cable-cum-broadcasting people, they have three traits: they're phenomenally greedy, they're phenomenally jealous, and they're filled with a lot of hate for their competitors...
...Robertses' bid not only reaffirmed Diller's status as a mogul manque, but it left CBS on the block for a takeover attempt by anyone from the Walt Disney Co. to cable-TV magnate Ted Turner. By agreeing last month to join forces with QVC, Tisch, 71, had shown himself willing to cash in half of his 20% stake in the network and to hand the titles of president and chief executive officer to Diller. Now, with the QVC deal gone aglimmering, CBS had what amounted to a COMPANY FOR SALE sign on its black granite headquarters in New York...
...Tisch moved fast to limit the damage. Declaring that "the merger discussion is at an end," he immediately walked away from QVC. "There was no chance," Diller recalls. "We absolutely knew that if Comcast made a competitive offer that Mr. Tisch would be gone in 10 seconds." To keep CBS stock from collapsing over the failure of the deal, Tisch immediately launched a $1.1 billion offer to buy back 22.6% of the company's shares for $325 a share. At the same time, Tisch partly made up for the defection of eight major CBS affiliates to the Fox network...
Still, Diller haggled with CBS over the treatment of options to buy 6 million shares of QVC stock. While Diller wanted to swap half the options for new ones in the merged company, Tisch balked at raising the issue before the deal was complete. Diller dropped his request, but it rankled the Tisch camp. "After they got engaged," says a source close to Tisch, "Diller demanded the dowry...
...fact, Diller could still wind up at CBS, perhaps by forming an investment group that buys the company. CBS insiders seemed open to such a possibility. "I think we gotta let the dust settle for a little while," says the source close to Tisch. But whether or not Diller ultimately joins CBS, the network of William Paley, Edward R. Murrow and Murder, She Wrote seems virtually certain to change hands before too many more seasons...