Here's a shocker: Just a month after engineering a major deal for a half-stake in Newsweek, Barry Diller is stepping down as CEO of IAC.
And he's getting a divorce from John Malone after a long, often tumultous marriage.
Diller announced Thursday that he has relinquished his post at the New York-based digital media company, part of a complicated deal that will see Liberty Media, one of IAC's biggest stakeholders, exit the business.
Liberty, run by Malone and based in Englewood, Colorado, sold back its interest in IAC (12.8 million shares, or about 60 percent of IAC's voting stock) for $220 million in cash. As part of the arrangement, Liberty will also get two IAC properties: Evite and Gifts.com.
Concurrently, IAC announced that Greg Blatt, formerly Match.com's CEO, has become the CEO of IAC. Diller's title is now chairman and senior executive.
"It's been clear to me for some time that this company needs a full time aggressive and aspirational executive in the CEO role," Diller said in a statement. "While I'm not going anywhere, IAC, with its operating businesses growing, large cash resources and virtually no debt, needs the kind of leadership that Greg Blatt can bring it in order to continue to grow and thrive many years into the future."
Diller will still own shares representing 34 percent of IAC's voting rights, making his the largest individual voting stake in the company.
The deal effectively ends a 17-year, often rocky business relationship between Diller and Malone. It began in 1993 when Diller joined King Communications. In 2008, Malone sued Diller and tried to get him ousted as chairman of IAC as Diller was trying to spin-off the then-sprawling IAC into five separate businesses. (Diller said then that Malone had "gone off the deep end.") Diller's plan ultimately went through.
In October, Diller stepped down as chairman of Live Nation, and was replaced by Malone.
“These last 17 years of my association with John Malone and Liberty Media have been a great, and occasionally, wild ride,” Diller said Thursday. "While I'll continue my association with Dr. Malone in Expedia, and as significant shareholders of the multiple spun-off companies, Liberty's exit from IAC is a turning point."
The news also comes little more than a month after Diller engineered a partnership with Sidney Harman for 50 percent of Newsweek -- an arrangement that vaulted Tina Brown, editor of the IAC-owned Daily Beast, into that role at the struggling newsweekly.
More to come. In the meantime, here's the press release:
IAC and Liberty Media Announce Equity Exchange
Barry Diller to Exchange and Hold All Class B Voting Stock
Greg Blatt Named CEO of IAC
NEW YORK and ENGLEWOOD, Colo., Dec. 2, 2010 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- IAC (Nasdaq: IACI) and Liberty Media Corporation ("Liberty") (Nasdaq: LCAPA, LCAPB, LINTA, LINTB, LSTZA, LSTZB) announced today that Liberty has exchanged its entire equity stake in IAC for a combination of operating assets and cash in a transaction intended to be tax-free to Liberty and IAC.
