Nothing much happens at CBS Corp. or Viacom Inc. without Sumner Redstone’s say-so. The aging media monarch has controlled Viacom for a generation and CBS for 15 years, dismissing CEOs and family members at will along the way.
Now 91 and ailing, Redstone has laid out what he wants to happen to his estimated $5.6 billion fortune, including those iconic media properties, after he dies. A family trust sets out who will pull the strings at CBS, the most-watched U.S. TV network, and Viacom, owner of the Nickelodeon and Comedy Central cable-TV channels.
Yet in settling his affairs, Redstone has created the potential for conflict with the seven trustees who’ll oversee his empire, the executives who run CBS and Viacom, and the grandchildren he’s made his beneficiaries. CBS’s annual meeting today highlights one key question: Who will succeed the absentRedstone as chairman of his most iconic and valuable holding?
It won’t be only family members who make that call. Two heirs, Redstone’s 61-year-old daughter Shari and her son Tyler Korff, will serve as trustees. That gives the Redstones a numerically smaller say than the outside members, all lawyers with longstanding ties to the aging patriarch.
Four other grandchildren will have to count on Shari Redstone and Korff, a 29-year-old attorney, along with the outside trustees, to look after their interests.
In addition, Redstone designated Viacom’s chief executive officer, Philippe Dauman, as a trustee, while leaving CBS Corp. CEO Les Moonves outside the inner circle.
The Sumner M. Redstone National Amusements Inc. trust was created for the benefit of its founder’s five grandchildren. It owns 80 percent of National Amusements Inc., the family company that, in turn, holds almost 80 percent of the voting rights in both CBS and Viacom. The trust will decide whether either company is sold, who’s on the boards and other matters that come to a shareholder vote.
Pressure Point
One of the earliest decisions is bound to be who replaces Redstone atop the CBS and Viacom boards, where he now serves as executive chairman.
Shari Redstone is vice chairman of both companies and president of National Amusements, roles that seemingly make her a successor to her father.