The Lion King Case Study

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Table of Contents

SITUATION ANALYSIS (SWOT ANALYSIS) ................................ ................................ ........................ 3

STRENGTHS: ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ ............. 3

WEAKNESSES: ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ .......... 4

OPPORTUNITIES: ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ ...... 6

THREATS: ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ .................. 7

DECISION CRITERIA: ................................ ................................ ................................ ............................. 8

ALTERNATIVES: ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ ....... 8

RECOMMENDATION: ................................ ................................ ................................ ............................ 11

ACTION PLAN: ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ ........ 11

Issue Statement

From the time of Roy Disney’s death until the early 1980s, the Walt Disney Company struggled with depression and downturn because it was not changing with the times and that Disney movies without innovation and “heart” lost their appeal to the market. Financial analysts took the company off their stock-to-buy lists. Overall, Disney made poor performance in financial reports, income and stock price fell down dramatically. However, in 1984, Michael Eisner joined as a CEO and resurrected Disney. His various divisions and multiple channels with cross-selling that “focused on leveraging the value of one content source across the company’s many divisions” and “profit multiplier business model” enjoyed a great success. Especially the successful release of The Lion King in 1994, the highest grossing hand-drawn animated feature of the year with an original script, made huge returns on different divisions for Disney.

Nevertheless, The Lion King’s success masked internal turmoil and issues at Disney. Under Eisner’s leadership and management, Disney’s focus on profit-multiplier model and synergy actually led to endless

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iterations of existing characters. During Eisner’s tenure, the company was not able to make another success after The