What lies ahead for Vivendi Universal?
Edgar Bronfman Jr. and Jean-Marie Messier will find themselves in a fishbowl in the months ahead. All their actions will be evaluated by the exacting world of investor capitalism. Families can tolerate under-performance by one of their own, but institutional investors won’t. What will ultimately count is whether Vivendi Universal finds a sustainable advantage over its competitors. Investors impose, executives dispose, and the leadership of Bronfman and Messier will have to find the right edge. Herbert Kelleher at Southwest Airlines, Meg Whitman at eBay, and Jeff Bezos at Amazon.com have proven that top talent can indeed be a sustainable advantage. Venture capitalists and institutional holders bet on those companies in part for their business model, but also in large part for those who will evolve and execute it. And what counts here is their talent for leadership, not their ties of brotherhood. Bronfman and Messier are proposing a business model for a global combination of entertainmen
