Thomas Owen Staggs (born 1961) is an American business executive and investor. He formerly worked at Disney for nearly 27 years, beginning in 1990, serving as chief operating officer (COO) and chief financial officer (CFO) of

The Walt Disney Company The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on Octobe ...

and as chairman of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Worldwide. He holds directorships on various company boards, including

Spotify Spotify (; ) is a proprietary Swedish audio streaming and media services provider founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. It is one of the largest music streaming service providers, with over 456 million monthly active use ...

Education and early life

Staggs was born in Illinois. He graduated from

Minnetonka High School Minnetonka High School, or MHS (locally referred to as Tonka), is a four-year public high school located in Minnetonka, Minnesota, United States, a western suburb of Minneapolis-St. Paul. The school enrolls about 3,444 students, and offers four ...

in 1978, and received a B.S. in business from the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public land-grant research university in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. ...

and an

MBA A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...

from the

Stanford Graduate School of Business The Stanford Graduate School of Business (also known as Stanford GSB) is the graduate business school of Stanford University, a private research university in Stanford, California. For several years it has been the most selective business schoo ...

Career

Staggs began his career as an investment banker for Dain Bosworth, then

Morgan Stanley Morgan Stanley is an American multinational investment management and financial services company headquartered at 1585 Broadway in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. With offices in more than 41 countries and more than 75,000 employees, the fir ...

before joining

Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

in 1990.

Disney

After joining Disney in 1990, Staggs rose from his role as a manager of strategic planning to senior vice president of strategic planning and development in 1995. Staggs became executive vice president and chief financial officer in 1998, and became Senior Executive Vice President and CFO in January 2000. As CFO, Staggs was instrumental in purchasing Pixar for $7.4 billion in 2006 as well as acquiring

Marvel Entertainment Marvel Entertainment, LLC (formerly Marvel Enterprises) is an American entertainment company founded in June 1998 and based in New York City, New York, formed by the merger of Marvel Entertainment Group and Toy Biz. The company is a wholly ow ...

for $4 billion in 2009. On January 1, 2010, Staggs became Chairman of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, where he "more than doubled operating profits, to $2.66 billion", while overseeing the company's roughly 140,000 cast members, theme parks, two cruise lines, and hotel and resort businesses. Staggs led the development of the MyMagic plus technology suite. and the creation of an ''Avatar'' theme land in Disney's Animal Kingdom park. Disney CEO

Bob Iger Robert Allen Iger (; born February 10, 1951) is an American businessman who is the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of The Walt Disney Company. He previously served as the President of ABC Television between 1994 and 1995 and the President and C ...

credited Staggs with leading "unprecedented growth and expansion, including the construction of Shanghai Disney", its $5.5 billion resort. On February 5, 2015, Staggs was named

chief operating officer A chief operating officer or chief operations officer, also called a COO, is one of the highest-ranking executive positions in an organization, composing part of the " C-suite". The COO is usually the second-in-command at the firm, especially if ...

of The Walt Disney Company. Despite "Disney’s rocky history of succession", Staggs was then widely reported as

heir apparent An heir apparent, often shortened to heir, is a person who is first in an order of succession and cannot be displaced from inheriting by the birth of another person; a person who is first in the order of succession but can be displaced by the b ...

to Bob Iger as the Disney CEO. On April 4, 2016, Disney announced that Staggs and the company had agreed to mutually part ways. Staggs stepped down as COO, effective May 6, 2016, remaining with the company as a "Special Advisor to the CEO" Bob Iger through the end of the fiscal year. Iger extended his contract as Disney's chairman and CEO to remain chairman through 2021. Following his departure from Disney, and prior to its August 2019 merger with Viacom, Staggs was in consideration to succeed

Les Moonves Leslie Roy Moonves (; born October 6, 1949) is an American media executive who was the chairman and CEO of CBS Corporation from 2003 until his resignation in September 2018 following numerous allegations of sexual harassment, sexual assault and ...

as CEO of CBS.

Forest Road

In October 2020, Staggs helped form

special-purpose acquisition company A special purpose acquisition company (SPAC; ), also known as a "blank check company", is a shell corporation listed on a stock exchange with the purpose of acquiring a private company, thus making it public without going through the traditional ...

(SPAC) Forest Road Acquisition Corp as a director, teaming with former Disney colleague Kevin Mayer, and the Forest Road Company (FRC), of which he is an original investor and advisory board member. Other board members and advisors of Forest Road Acquisition Corp include FRC founder Zachary Tarica,

Shaquille O'Neal Shaquille Rashaun O'Neal ( ; born March 6, 1972), known commonly as "Shaq" ( ), is an American former professional basketball player who is a sports analyst on the television program '' Inside the NBA''. O'Neal is regarded as one of the greate ...

Mark Burg Mark Burg is an American film producer, manager and actor. He is the co-founder of Evolution Entertainment and produced the ''Saw'' film series as well as the CBS television series ''Two and a Half Men''. Biography Burg graduated from the Roy ...

and Martin Luther King III. FRC is a "full-service provider" to the independent film industry, loaning funds against state film tax credits. FRC began public trading on November 25, 2020 (NYSE:FRX), and was reported that month to have raised more than $US300 million, and to have funded and brokered over 150 film and TV projects through state motion picture tax credits. In February 2021, an agreement for a three-way merger between Forest Road Acquisition Corp, Myx Fitness Holdings and

Beachbody The Beachbody Company is a publicly traded American fitness and media company based in El Segundo, California. It operates the brands Beachbody On Demand, Team Beachbody, MYXfitness and Openfit. The company also sells dietary supplements such as ...

was entered into, which values the new business combination at $US2.9 billion. On February 18, 2021, Forest Road Acquisition Corp II filed for an IPO, with Staggs as co-founder, raising $US350 million, recorded in early March.

Board memberships

Since leaving Disney, Staggs has been an active investor and advisor for various companies, including serving as executive chairman of Vejo, Inc. nutritional beverage and device company, and of Bertsch Industries. He is also a member of the boards of directors of: *

*Forest Road Acquisition Corp. *Forest Road Acquisition Corp. II * Curtis L. Carlson School of Management * The Center for Early Education *PureForm Global *REQPay, Inc. *WETA *Allemand Subsidiary, Inc.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Staggs, Thomas O 1961 births American chief operating officers American film studio executives American entertainment industry businesspeople American media executives Carlson School of Management alumni Date of birth missing (living people) Disney executives Living people Place of birth missing (living people) Stanford Graduate School of Business alumni Stanford University alumni