By Jessica Toonkel
John Malone's Liberty Media has named a board member and seasoned sports executive as its new CEO and president, driving ahead with a strategy of streamlining the business while capitalizing on selective growth opportunities.
Liberty Media, which owns the global motorsport juggernaut Formula One and has a stake in ticketing-and-events company Live Nation, among other holdings, has tapped 56-year-old Derek Chang as its new leader, effective Feb. 1. Chang has served on Liberty's board since 2021. He first worked for Malone decades ago at TCI Communications.
Chang will continue Liberty's focus on its existing businesses and will look for ways to grow Formula One and MotoGP motorcycle racing, he said. Liberty Media announced in April that it was acquiring Dorna Sports, which owns the rights to MotoGP motorcycle races, a deal that is under scrutiny by European regulators. Chang said Liberty hopes to close that deal by midyear.
"We will be looking for opportunities in the sports ecosystem," Chang said. "We are simplifying, but we have the flexibility and the wherewithal to be opportunistic."
Billionaire Malone, who will turn 84 this year, oversees both Liberty Media and Liberty Global and has been simplifying his portfolio in recent months. In the fall, Liberty split off its Liberty Sirius XM Holdings into Sirius XM, an independent company, and in November longtime CEO Greg Maffei announced he was stepping down. Meanwhile, Charter Communications in November agreed to acquire Malone's Liberty Broadband business. The moves raised questions among some investors about whether the company was in wind-down mode.
Chang said Liberty's effort to simplify its businesses has been well-received by investors, so that strategy won't change. But the company will look to grow Formula One.
Most recently, Chang was executive chair of EverPass Media, a joint venture between the NFL and private-equity firm RedBird Capital Partners, to distribute sports programming in bars and restaurants. Before that, he served as CEO of NBA China, among other sports-related roles.
He said he sees a window to build up Formula One and MotoGP's digital presence, specifically as more streamers are looking for short-form content. The broadcast rights for Formula One are currently owned by Disney's ESPN and are up for renewal at the end of the year.
Formula One's fandom has grown in part due to Netflix's "Drive to Survive" hit series and additional races in the U.S. Liberty has benefited from that expansion in other ways, including by owning around 40 acres of land on which the paddock sits for one of the new races, in Las Vegas.
Write to Jessica Toonkel at jessica.toonkel@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
January 08, 2025 16:44 ET (21:44 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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