Sony Hack Saga: CEO Michael Lynton Steps Down

Finally!!! Now we can await Rothman's exit next.

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Quote:

UPDATED: Sony Pictures Entertainment Chairman and CEO Michael Lynton announced Friday that he is stepping down from the entertainment conglomerate to focus his attention on his chairmanship of Snap, Inc., the social media owner of Snapchat in which he has a major investment. Lynton is leaving his post atop the conglomerate’s motion picture, television and music units but will remain on as co-CEO for six months to help lead a search for his replacement. The announcement of the departure said Sony Corporation CEO Kazuo Hirai will focus with Lynton on the search for a new leader, with the Japanese businessman taking on a much higher profile in the operation. He will serve alongside Lynton as co-CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment and open a second office for himself on the Culver City lot. Among those rumored to be in line for Lynton’s post: DreamWorks Animation founder and former CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg, Tribune Media president and CEO Peter Liguori and Jim Gianopulos, recently ousted as chairman and CEO of Fox Filmed Entertainment. Two sources close to Gianopulos said, however, that there had been no contact between him and Sony. Another possibility floated late last year: that the Tokyo-based conglomerate would merge the troubled entertainment unit with its more profitable gaming division. That would potentially put Andrew House, the boss of Sony Interactive Entertainment, in charge of the film and television studio. “It has been an extraordinary 13 years and an honor to work at Sony with some of the most talented and creative people in the entertainment space,” Lynton said in a statement. Explaining his move to the tech upstart he added: “I have been involved with Evan and Snapchat since its early days, and given its growth since then, decided the time was right to transition and focus on my role as Chairman of the Board of Snap Inc.” The Harvard-educated Lynton was a respected leader in Hollywood, but his regime suffered multiple blows, particularly the 2014 hack of the studio’s computers that led to a series of embarrassing revelations about internal operations. Motion picture co-chair Amy Pascal lost her job following the scandal and workers from top to bottom of the organization were unsettled by revelations in the emails. More recently, Sony’s Motion Picture Group has struggled to find box office winners, with a string of under-performing films, including “Ghostbusters,” “Inferno,” and, most recently, “Passengers,” the sci-fi romance, starring Chris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence.

Sony Hack Saga: CEO Michael Lynton Steps Down