Discovery Communications Extends CEO's Contract
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Friday, September 11, 2009
Discovery Communications' chief executive and president, David Zaslav, will stay in his job until 2015 and receive a significant bump in compensation under a contract extension signed this week, the company's board of directors said Thursday.
Zaslav's contract was extended two years before its original termination date because the board, happy with Zaslav's performance, wanted to lock him up.
"By any measure or metric, Discovery Communications has had a terrific performance, and securing David's leadership gives me great confidence [that] the best is yet to come," Discovery founder John Hendricks said in a statement.
Zaslav came from NBC Universal's cable division to take over the Silver Spring cable television company in November 2006. His base salary will rise from $2 million to $3 million per year and he will receive additional compensation tied to Discovery's ratings and revenue performance, the company said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The value of his performance-based compensation can go up to $4 million initially and then rise by an additional $500,000 each year through 2014, the documents say. Guaranteed bonuses have been eliminated.
When Zaslav took over Discovery, it was privately held by Advance/Newhouse Communications and Discovery Holding, run by Liberty Media Chairman John C. Malone. Advance, Malone and Cox Communications were longtime stakeholders in Discovery, founded in 1985 by Hendricks.
Under Zaslav, Discovery bought out Cox's stake in 2007, beginning the process of streamlining ownership. Advance and Malone combined their stakes in the company to take it public about a year ago. Malone and Advance each holds a seat on Discovery's board.
"David has created a tremendous amount of shareholder value by building Discovery's brands and increasing market share around the world, and in the process, nearly doubled the company's operating cash flow," Malone said in a statement.
Shares of Discovery closed up 4.6 percent at $28.42 Thursday, and have doubled in price for year, beating the Nasdaq composite index by more than 60 percentage points.
