Stock Gains Fuel Discovery Exec Pay
CEO David Zaslav Takes Home $19.1M in 2007; Chairman and Founder John Hendricks $57.9M
By Robert Marich -- Broadcasting & Cable, 6/12/2008 2:53:00 PM
In his first year on the job, Discovery Communications CEO David Zaslav received $19.1 million in cash and stock-option compensation, according to the proxy statement filed by the parent of the cable-network operator.
Zaslav -- who was recruited from NBC Universal, where he was president of cable and domestic television and new-media distribution -- was second in pay to Discovery chairman and founder John Hendricks, whose compensation was put at a hefty $57.9 million in cash and options.
Those salary figures came in a lengthy proxy statement for Discovery Holding, which announced earlier this month that it will undergo a complex restructuring to bring in shareholder Advance/Newhouse, consolidating ownership.
The proxy said the consolidation will have an “aggregate transaction value” of $6.9 billion. After the combination, cable financier John Malone will hold 23% voting power in the new Discovery Communications, while Advance/Newhouse will hold 26%.
Regarding executive pay in 2007, a big part of those paydays came from incentives tied to the company’s stock price, which soared 52% in 2007. Also, some of Hendricks’ stock-option compensation came from options granted in prior years that vested.
Zaslav’s base salary was $2 million and his compensation included $5.5 million in bonuses, $2.5 million of which came for originally taking the job in January 2007. Hendricks, who founded Discovery in 1982, got a $1 million salary and a $500,000 bonus.
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