Disney News

Category: Disney Co.

  • Disney Donates $3 Million to Make-A-Wish

    Disney Donates $3 Million to Make-A-Wish

    Earlier this month, The Walt Disney Company announced it is donating $3 million to Make-A-Wish to help grant even more wishes for children with critical illnesses and their families.

    The news follows the 2018 #ShareYourEars campaign celebrating 90 years of Mickey, which saw hundreds of thousands of Disney fans create amazing “ear photos” with their kids, families, friends and even pets to make a difference in the lives of children and families around the world.

    Since 1980, Disney has helped Make-A-Wish grant the wishes of children with critical illnesses and their families. Currently, nearly 10,000 Disney wishes are granted every year with Make-A-Wish, helping wish kids replace fear with confidence, sadness with joy and anxiety with hope. For wish kids such as Quintino and their families, this partnership creates treasured memories:

    #ShareYourEars is part of the Disney Team of Heroes philanthropic initiative and outreach program to deliver comfort and inspiration to families around the world.

    In March 2018, The Walt Disney Company made a five-year, US $100 million commitment to reinvent the patient and family experience in children’s hospitals and is working with children’s wish-granting organizations around the world to fulfill wishes for children facing critical illnesses.

  • Walt Disney Co. Partners With University of Florida Online To Provide Free Tuition Disney Employees

    Walt Disney Co. Partners With University of Florida Online To Provide Free Tuition Disney Employees

    The Walt Disney Company is partnering with University of Florida Online to expand access to high quality online bachelor’s degrees.

    Disney Aspire, recently launched by The Walt Disney Company, is a comprehensive education benefits program focused on the career development of Disney’s workforce. With the Disney Aspire initiative, more than 80,000 full-time and part-time hourly employees, who have more than 90 days of service, will be eligible to have 100 percent of their tuition, required textbooks and course materials, plus application and program fees paid up front by the company.

    As part of this relationship, Disney employees may apply to one of several fully online bachelor’s degrees – the Bachelor of Arts or Bachelor of Science in business administration from the Warrington College of Business; the Bachelor of Science in sport management from the College of Health and Human Performance; and the Bachelor of Science in public relations, and the Bachelor of Science in telecommunication from the College of Journalism and Communications. If granted admission by the University of Florida, Disney cast members could begin UF Online classes in January 2019 as part of the University’s spring semester. Disney employees and Cast Members can learn more and sign up at aspire.disney.com. As part of the enrollment process a coach from Guild Education will be available to determine their eligibility to receive educational benefits, review their academic background, and provide qualified prospective students with a unique link to the UF Online admissions application.

    “Expanding access to high quality education and career development is a core value for the University of Florida and we look forward to working with Disney,” said UF Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs Joe Glover.

    The Florida Chamber of Commerce projects that by 2021, 64 percent of Florida jobs will require a post-secondary degree.

    “Disney sets the standard for customer experience and we are happy to partner with them to set the standard for education programs as well,” Glover added.

    Disney is the third employer in UF Online’s growing Employer Pathways program, which launched in June. Walmart and Discover Financial Services are the two other major corporate partners that have also introduced generous education benefits for students that are qualified to gain admissions into UF Online.

    “This UF Online and Disney partnership is another great step forward for future Gators. Able to enroll and complete their UF degree at no cost, and in a versatile online format, qualified Disney cast members now have an amazing opportunity to earn a UF degree and join the ranks of Gator grads across the state and around the world,” said Evangeline Tsibris Cummings, Assistant Provost and Director of UF Online.

    “At The Walt Disney Company we strive to empower and support employees in their professional and personal lives,” said Jayne Parker, Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer for The Walt Disney Company.  “We are constantly looking at ways to help people realize their ambitions and fulfill their dreams, and, as part of that, we are proud to offer Disney Aspire, the most comprehensive program of its kind.

    UF Online is the University of Florida’s online undergraduate experience. A highly selective and engaging online pathway to a UF degree, UF Online academic programs are all designed and taught by the very same faculty that teach on the University’s main Gainesville campus. Welcoming applications into 20 fully online bachelor’s degrees, UF Online currently serves over 3,000 students. And as of summer 2018, UF Online has celebrated the graduation of over 1,500 Gators through the UF Online pathway.

  • Disney Offers Free Tuition For 80,000 Hourly Workers

    Disney Offers Free Tuition For 80,000 Hourly Workers

    The Walt Disney Co. is offering to pay full tuition for hourly workers who want to earn a college degree, finish a high school diploma or learn a new skill, the entertainment giant said Wednesday.

    As many as 80,000 hourly workers in the United States could be eligible for the program, which pays upfront tuition for employees taking online classes starting this fall.

    Disney initially will invest $50 million into the “Disney Aspire” program and up to $25 million a year after that, the company said.

    “We can’t wait to see what paths our cast members take with Disney Aspire,” the company said in a blog post.

    Disney joins other large corporations that have begun paying tuition for workers in a job market with historically low unemployment. In May, Walmart said it will offer workers the chance to get a college degree at three universities with online programs.

    Starbucks partnered with Arizona State University to offer tuition coverage for U.S. workers earning a bachelor’s degree.

    Disney is rolling out its program in phases, with the first limited to online classes. In-classroom courses could be added if there’s demand for them, a spokeswoman said.

    Disney’s program is being administered by Guild Education, the same Denver-based firm operating Walmart’s program.

  • Disney, 21st Century Fox Shareholders Vote to Approve $71.3 Billion Merger

    Disney, 21st Century Fox Shareholders Vote to Approve $71.3 Billion Merger

    Disney’s acquisition of fox is nearly complete. Friday, shareholders approve Disney’s $71.3 billion acquisition of Fox entertainment assets.

    The tie-up brings together Marvel’s X-Men and Avengers franchises and creates an entertainment behemoth in the digital streaming era. The shareholder vote caps a saga that began in December 2017, when Disney made its first offer for part of Rupert Murdoch’s media conglomerate. It kicked off a bidding war with Comcast, which dropped out last week focus on attempted buyout of the European pay-TV operator Sky.

    The Fox deal will help Disney compete with technology players like Amazon and Netflix. The agreement is not expected to close for several months and still requires regulatory approvals.

    Source: AP

  • Disney Sued By Dog Trainer Who Brings Service Dogs to Parks

    Disney Sued By Dog Trainer Who Brings Service Dogs to Parks

    Disney is being sued by a dog trainer who brings service dogs to the parks. If you’ve been to Disney Parks, then you’ve probably seen plenty of service dogs as many trainers bring them to the parks to expose them to crowds. One trainer however, has filed a lawsuit in Orlando federal court this week alleging discrimination and retaliation by Walt Disney Parks and Resort.

    Susan Grill claims that the cast members, Disney security, and managers harass her when she brings her dogs to the parks. Grill, who has epilepsy and migraines filed a complaint in May 2017 with the Florida Commission on Human Rights, and she believes Disney is retaliating against her for filing it, the lawsuit said.

    Disney allows service animals — a dog or a miniature horse trained to help their owners with disabilities, according to Disney’s definition — at most places within its Orlando theme parks and hotels, according to its website.

    “This person’s complaints were already reviewed by the Florida Commission on Human Rights, which found that no unlawful practice occurred,” a Disney spokeswoman said in a statement.

    According to the lawsuit, in February 2017, Grill took a stroll around Disney Springs with three poodles. Grill often trains her dogs at Disney to adjust them to crowds. “All three were well-behaved and were wearing clearly labeled gear identifying them as ‘service dogs,’” the lawsuit said.

    Two Disney security guards stopped her and told her she could not train her dogs on Disney property, the suit said. An Orange County deputy sheriff who also approached her demanded to see the dogs’ certification papers and said the poodles were “fake,” the suit says.

    Disney security told Grill she couldn’t leave until their case was closed — which made her feel intimidated, she said in the lawsuit. A Disney Springs manager allowed Grill to stay but warned she was forbidden from returning with the dogs. Grill tried to argue, and the manager told her to leave immediately, the lawsuit said.

    The lawsuit alleged Disney’s head of security told Grill “…If she did not want people to grab her service dog and scream curse words at her, then she should not bring her service dog to the Disney Parks,” the lawsuit said.

  • Disney Wins Bidding War Over Fox As Comcast Drops Out Of Battle

    Disney Wins Bidding War Over Fox As Comcast Drops Out Of Battle

    Disney and Comcast have been battling for months for control of Twenty-First Century Fox’s entertainment business, but today Comcast dropped out of the fight leaving Disney the winner of one of the highest-stakes duels in media history.

    “Comcast does not intend to pursue further the acquisition of the Twenty-First Century Fox assets and, instead, will focus on our recommended offer for Sky,” the company said in a statement Thursday.

    Comcast had been locked in a battle with the Walt Disney Company for the bulk of Mr. Murdoch’s Fox empire, with the cable company submitting a $65 billion offer for the assets last month topping Disney’s initial $52 billion offer. Disney quickly pushed back on Comcast’s offer with a higher bid of $71.3 billion, which Mr. Murdoch and his board quickly accepted. Shareholders for both Disney and Fox will vote on the proposed merger on July 27.

    CEO Brian Roberts, who had sought to outdo Disney given Comcast’s history with the company, which dates to an unsolicited takeover bid rebuffed by Disney in 2004, delivered a sporting statement. “I’d like to congratulate Bob Iger and the team at Disney and commend the Murdoch family and Fox for creating such a desirable and respected company,” he said.  The Department of Justice has already given the green light to Disney’s bid as long as it sells 22 regional sports networks.

    Comcast Corp. and Fox have been battling for Fox and Sky in order to amass more programming as they compete for viewers with both traditional TV networks and technology companies such as Netflix and Amazon.

    Comcast’s stock rose more than 2.5 percent today in premarket trading. Shares of Disney climbed 1.2 percent, while Fox’s stock dipped 1 percent before the opening bell.

  • Bernie Sanders Blasts Disney CEO Bob Iger On Twitter Over $400 Million Pay

    Bernie Sanders Blasts Disney CEO Bob Iger On Twitter Over $400 Million Pay

    U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders took aim at the mouse house today on twitter today calling out, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of The Walt Disney Company, Bob Iger over his $400 million pay.

    The longtime senator from Vermont asks in a tweet why Iger is paid hundreds of millions of dollars, while workers at Disney theme parks struggle to make ends meet.

    “Does Disney CEO Bob Iger have a good explanation for why he is being compensated more than $400 million while workers at Disneyland are homeless and relying on food stamps to feed their families?” tweeted Sanders. Take a look below.

    Sanders attacked Iger’s hefty pay package, which some estimates say could earn the executive as much as $423 million over the next four years if he hits all of his performance goals.

    Sanders has targeted Disney before.  While on the presidential campaign trail he used the media conglomerate as Exhibit A in what he calls a “rigged economy” at an Anaheim campaign event. “Anybody make a living wage at Disney?” Sanders asked the crowd.

    Sanders was referencing a survey conducted by the Economic Roundtable — which found that 73% of Disney employees who were questioned said they don’t earn enough to pay for such basic expenses as rent, food and gas. It also found that 11% of resort employees have been homeless or have not had a place of their own in the last two years.

    Disney dismissed the study calling it inaccurate and unscientific and paid for by labor groups seeking a pay raise. Disney officials have said that the average annual pay for hourly workers at the resort is $37,000, which calculates to about $17.80 an hour.

    In a Facebook post Iger responded to Sanders: “To Bernie Sanders: We created 11,000 new jobs at Disneyland in the past decade and our company has created 18,000 in the U.S. in the last five years. How many jobs have you created? What have you contributed to the U.S. economy?”

    Sanders has been rallying with Disneyland workers in Anaheim, California, as they pushed for a minimum $15 per hour wage.

    “The struggle that you are waging here in Anaheim is not just for you,” Sanders told Disneyland workers last month at a rally. “It is a struggle for millions of workers all across this country who are sick and tired of working longer hours for lower wages.”

    Iger has thrown around the idea of running for president and he’s shown he willing to hold his ground and fire back, so we’ll have to see if this fizzles out or turns into a full out twitter war.

  • Disney and Pixar Sued For Plagiarizing Inside Out… Again

    Disney and Pixar Sued For Plagiarizing Inside Out… Again

    Disney and Pixar are being sued for allegedly plagiarizing the idea for 2015’s hit “Inside Out”.

    A lawsuit filed in a California federal court, by Damon Pourshian, states that Pixar’s film infringes on a script the Canadian man wrote in 1999 also titled Inside Out, which eventually got turned into a short film a year later in 2000.

    Pourshian claims the film has more in common than just the name and his work has many similarities to Inside Out, as his script and short movie tell the story of a young boy named Lewis reacting to everyday life “through anthropomorphized representations of his bodily organs,” which are seen inside Lewis’ body.

    The short film also shows these organs reacting to the real world and features a personification of Lewis’ brain which operates a command center. The short movie includes Brain, Heart, Colon, Stomach, and Bladder as the main organ characters, and they communicate and argue with each other.

    In Pixar’s Inside Out, the main character is a girl named Riley and the core characters are her emotions: Joy, Sadness, Fear, Anger and Disgust.

    The 20-page lawsuit details more than two-dozen substantial similarities in content, theme and characters between the two films, many illustrated with comparative images. The complaint notes that, “The obvious and striking similarities between Mr. Pourshian’s and Disney/Pixar’s Inside Out extend from overarching themes to specific details, and they are far too numerous to be attributable to chance.”

    The suit goes on to say Pourshian created the script and film at Sheridan College, which “has sent large numbers of its graduates to work at Disney and Pixar and is considered a ‘feeder’ school for Disney and Pixar.”

    Pourshian’s classmates also reportedly noticed the similarities between the two projects upon viewing Pixar’s Inside Out. Purshian is seeking unspecified damages and for his name to be added to the Inside Out credits.

    This isn’t the first time Disney and Pixar have been sued for Inside Out, A 2017 copyright infringement lawsuit brought against Inside Out last year by child development expert Denise Daniels was dismissed last month by U.S. District Judge Philip Gutierrez. In her suit, Daniels claimed the film bore a striking resemblance to a TV project, The Moodsters, she’d developed and pitched numerous times to Disney executives between 2006 and 2009.

    Also back in June, author Carla Jo Masterson filed suit in a Nevada federal court, claiming the film was based on her book, What’s On The Other Side Of The Rainbow? (The Secret Of The Golden Mirror), as well as her screenplay, “The Secret of the Golden Mirror.”

    Both works “are original, creative, and artistic stories about how children identify, understand the reasons for, and manage the effects of their emotions,” the suit reads.

    “The specific original, artistic, and creative expression and device used by Carla J. Masterson in ‘What’s On the Other Side of the Rainbow?’ and ‘The Secret of the Golden Mirror’ is to depict the childhood emotions of Joy, Fear, Sad, Anger, Laughter, Friendship, Love, and Shy as characters that appear throughout the book in consistent and continuing configurations and colors.”

    While there maybe some similarities with the concepts of these projects that still doesn’t mean that Disney plagiarized anything as there are clear differences as well. The courts will decide in the end, but if anyone has a real claim, just think “Herman’s Head”.

    The director of Inside Out, Pete Docter, has recently been named Pixar’s new chief creative officer.

  • Disney Wins U.S. Approval for Fox Deal, Putting Comcast On The Ropes

    Disney Wins U.S. Approval for Fox Deal, Putting Comcast On The Ropes

    It’s not a knockout yet, but Disney has dealt a big blow to Comcast for a potential rival bid in the Fox deal. Walt Disney Co. has just won U.S. antitrust approval for its $71 billion purchase of 21st Century Fox Inc.’s entertainment assets.

    In order to secure Justice Department approval of its acquisition of major 21st Century Fox assets, Disney has agreed to sell off Fox’s 22 regional sports networks.

    The Justice Department on Wednesday filed a complaint in federal court seeking to block Disney from acquiring the regional sports networks arguing that Disney’s ownership of the national sports powerhouse ESPN created anti-competitive conflicts, but announced a settlement agreement with Disney that calls for the divestitures.

    “American consumers have benefitted from head-to-head competition between Disney and Fox’s cable sports programming that ultimately has prevented cable television subscription prices from rising even higher,” said Delrahim, assistant attorney general and head of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division. “Today’s settlement will ensure that sports programming competition is preserved in the local markets where Disney and Fox compete for cable and satellite distribution.”

    The DOJ’s sign off on Disney’s $71.3 billion transaction on Wednesday is a big hurdle for rival Comcast in the battle to acquire the major portion of Rupert Murdoch’s TV and film empire.

    Fox last week accepted a sweetened bid from Disney, after the two media juggernauts had been going head to head with a $65 billion offer coming from Comcast about two weeks ago, nearly six months after Disney initially bid $52.4 billion for Fox in December. The $38-a-share price is about $10 a share higher than what Disney offered in December — and $3 above Comcast’s bid.

    The fight is definitely not over. Comcast is expected to respond with yet another offer, amid reports it is reaching out to potential acquisition partners if the bidding should climb as high as $90 billion. Analysts have speculated the Fox assets could fetch as much as $42-$43 a share.

    The bidding war was expected as the two media giants battle over Fox’s movie production business as well as FX, NatGeo, Fox’s 30 percent stake in Hulu and its international assets, including Star India and its 39 percent stake in European pay TV giant Sky. 21st Century Fox is the next big prize as the media industry consolidates to survive against competitors like Netflix.

  • BREAKING: Disney Raises Bid To $71 Billion For 21st Century Fox

    BREAKING: Disney Raises Bid To $71 Billion For 21st Century Fox

    The bidding war for Twenty-First Century Fox’s assets is in full swing and both Disney and Comcast are battling it out in an attempt to gain control of the companies lucrative assets. The Walt Disney Co. isn’t holding any punches either as the company raised its bid for Fox’s assets to $71.3 billion, the companies announced today.

    The two media juggernauts are going head to head with a $65 billion offer coming from Comcast just a week ago, nearly six months after Disney initially bid $52.4 billion for Fox in December. The new bid is $38 a share, up from Disney’s $28 a share offer in December and rivaling Comcast’s $35 a share all-cash bid last week.

    The bidding war was expected as the two media giants battle over Fox’s movie production business as well as FX, NatGeo, Fox’s 30 percent stake in Hulu and its international assets, including Star India and its 39 percent stake in European pay TV giant Sky. 21st Century Fox is the next big prize as the media industry consolidates to survive against competitors like Netflix.

    During a call with investors today, Disney CEO Bob Iger was extremely confident about the potential acquisition. “We believe that we have a much better opportunity — both in terms of approval, and the timing of that approval — than Comcast does in this case,” he said.

    Disney again emphasized the business and strategic benefits of the takeover for investors. “The acquisition of 21st Century Fox will bring significant financial value to the shareholders of both companies, and after six months of integration planning we’re even more enthusiastic and confident in the strategic fit of the assets and the talent at Fox,” Iger earlier said in a statement. “At a time of dynamic change in the entertainment industry, the combination of Disney’s and Fox’s unparalleled collection of businesses and franchises will allow us to create more appealing high-quality content, expand our direct-to-consumer offerings and international presence, and deliver more personalized and compelling entertainment experiences to meet growing consumer demand around the world.”

    Disney’s new bid allows Fox shareholders to choose cash or stock. Fox called the new Disney offer “superior” to the Comcast proposal.