Former Disney Chairman Bob Iger Says They Didn't Buy Twitter Because It Would Be Irresponsible

During his time at Disney, Bob Iger oversaw some of Hollywood's largest acquisitions. Under the executive's watch, the Mouse bought entertainment stalwarts like Marvel and Lucasfilm, and there was even a point where Iger's team at Disney had considered stepping into the land of social media by discussing an acquisition of Twitter. Ultimately, Iger decided the buying of Twitter would do "more harm than good" for the company.

"We're in the business of manufacturing fun at Disney, of doing nothing but good, even though there are others today that criticize Disney for the opposite, which is wrong. And this was just something that we were not ready to take on and I was not ready to take on as the CEO of a company. And I thought it would have been irresponsible," Iger said in an appearance at the Vox Code Conference (via The Wrap).

While Iger admitted the purchase of a massive social media network would have helped market Disney's various verticals, he thought about it over the weekend before deciding there were too many "challenges" involved in a such a deal.

"Frankly, it would have been a phenomenal solution, distribution wise, then after we sold the whole concept of the Disney board and the Twitter board, and we're really ready to execute the negotiation that was just about done. Interestingly enough, I went home, contemplated for a weekend, and thought I'm not looking at this as carefully as I need to look at it," Iger added. "Yes, it's a great solution from a distribution perspective. But it would come with so many other challenges and complexities that as a manager of a great global brand I was not prepared to take on. Major distraction, and having to manage circumstances that weren't even close to anything that we had faced before."

Earlier this year, serial entrepreneur Elon Musk offered to buy Twitter and now finds himself embroiled in consistent legal battles after attempting to back out of the acquisition.

"Twitter's latest offer to simply provide additional details regarding the company's own testing methodologies, whether through written materials or verbal explanations, is tantamount to refusing Mr. Musk's data requests," Musk's legal team said one legal filing. "Twitter's effort to characterize it otherwise is merely an attempt to obfuscate and confuse the issue. Mr. Musk has made it clear that he does not believe the company's lax testing methodologies are adequate so he must conduct his own analysis. The data he has requested is necessary to do so."