MEXICO CITY, Sept 18 (Askume) – Televisa Univision, the Mexican-American media company that merged content from the two biggest Spanish-language broadcasters, said on Wednesday it had replaced Chief Executive Wade Davis.
Davis, who has served as CEO since the joint venture was formed in 2021, will be succeeded by Mexican Daniel Alegre, who most recently served as CEO of non-fungible token maker Yuga Labs.
The company said in a statement that the move was part of a “long-term succession planning process.” Davis will serve as vice chairman and continue to serve as a member of the board’s executive committee.
According to people familiar with the matter, Davis was fired because some of the company’s results did not meet internal expectations.
“He has lost the confidence of the United States, Mexico and the IMF,” the source said.
Davis, a former ViacomCBS executive who lives in the United States, did not respond to a request for comment.
“We couldn’t have chosen a better successor than Daniel, who has an incredible track record of operational and strategic execution,” Davis said in a statement to TelevisionUnivision.
Allegri, who will take over as CEO on Thursday, previously worked at video game maker Activision Blizzard and spent 16 years at Google, where he oversaw the tech giant’s expansion into Latin America and Asia-Pacific countries.
Television is a joint venture between Televisa (TLEVISACPO.MX), Mexico’s largest broadcaster, and Univision, the Spanish-language broadcaster in the United States. Davis oversaw the launch of streaming service Vix, which now has about 50 million monthly active users worldwide and competes with Netflix Inc (NFLX.O) and Disney Plus (DIS.N) .
Davis, who was appointed to lead the newly formed company in 2021, has served as Univision’s chief executive since Searchlight Capital Partners, founded by Davis , and ForgeLight completed a majority acquisition of the network in 2020.
SoftBank (9984.T) is one of the original investors in the television channel along with Latin American funds, private equity firm ForgeLight, Google and The Rain Group.
The TV company reported a 4% drop in profit to $1.61 billion in 2023. According to the second quarter report, the company had a debt of $9.8 billion.
However, the company expects both total and advertising revenue to grow so far in 2023 and 2024, with much of it driven by the Mexican market. Company executives expect strong profits in the US market, sources said.
