On Tuesday February 25th, Disney made the shocking announcement that their current CEO, Bob Iger, will be stepping down as chairman of the Walt Disney Company. Iger has been CEO of the company since 2005 and only mentioned that he would be stepping down in 2021, so the announcement of this is a surprise to many. Iger will still be a part of the company as executive chairman until 2021, and the CEO mentioned that he wanted to be part of the creative side now. Particularly he stated that “With the successful launch of Disney’s direct-to-consumer businesses and the integration of Twenty-First Century Fox well underway, I believe this is the optimal time to transition to a new CEO.”

Taking Iger’s place as CEO effective immediately will be Bob Chapek. Chapek is best known for being the chairman of Disney Parks, experiences and products, which suggests that he could still be good leader for the Walt Disney corporation. However, following this announcement, Disney’s stock fell about 2.5%.

Despite stepping down as CEO, one can not forget about all the contributions Iger made to the Disney company. Iger has been involved with huge acquisitions, including the huge $71 billion acquisition of Fox, the $4 billion for both Star Wars and Marvel, and the $7.4 billion of Pixar Animation. He was also heavily involved with the launch of Shanghai Disneyland as well. Even though Iger’s reign as Disney CEO may be over now, he will be helping Chapek with transitioning as CEO while he is serving as executive chairman. He ended his stance on having Chapek as new CEO of Disney by stating, “with everything else falling into place, the time seemed right”.