Sony Pictures CEO Tony Vinciquerra to step down, succeeded by Ravi Ahuja

Sony is changing the guard at its Culver City film and television studio.

Tony Vinciquerra, Sony Pictures Entertainment’s chairman and chief executive who quietly rebuilt the studio’s business over seven years, will hand the reins in January to a key member of his management team, Ravi Ahuja.

Ahuja currently runs Sony’s global television studios, which have shepherded such hits as “The Crown,” “The Boys,” “Cobra Kai” and “The Last of Us.” A former television executive at Walt Disney Co. and Fox Corp., Ahuja joined Sony Pictures three years ago to oversee its India business and television production. Since he arrived, his portfolio has steadily grown.

The 53-year-old executive was promoted to chief operating officer for the entire studio in April, a move that signaled Sony’s succession plan.

As part of the transition, Vinciquerra, 70, will remain with Sony as an advisor through 2025.

Hollywood Inc.

Company Town Roundtable: Tony Vinciquerra

Dec. 14, 2022

Sony said Monday that Ahuja will take over as studio president and chief executive on Jan. 2. He will report to Sony Group Corp. Chair and Chief Executive Kenichiro Yoshida and Hiroki Totoki, the president and chief operating officer of the Japanese electronics company.

“Ravi brings with him years of experience from his time at some of the world’s most successful entertainment companies, and we look forward to working more closely with him in his new role,” Yoshida said in a statement announcing the moves.

The transition has been in the works for more than two years. Vinciquerra recruited Ahuja, who also worked for him during their joint tenure at Rupert Murdoch’s Fox. Vinciquerra built the network business for Murdoch, and Ahuja served as chief financial officer.

Ahuja, in a statement, expressed gratitude for his new role at Sony and for Vinciquerra’s support.

“I am energized by the opportunities ahead and am lucky to work alongside thousands of talented colleagues around the world at SPE and at our Sony sister companies,” Ahuja said.

Vinciquerra is credited for adroitly steering Sony Pictures during a period of tumult among traditional Hollywood studios.

“The extraordinary turnaround at SPE over the last 10 years would not have been possible without Tony’s deep experience and expertise in the entertainment space, his strategic vision and his outstanding leadership,” Yoshida said in a statement.

Vinciquerra quickly recognized that the linear television channel business was doomed and worked to unwind Sony’s cable channels except in Latin America, Spain and India, where the business is still vibrant.

Then, while other entertainment companies, including Walt Disney Co., Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount Global, raced to build their own streaming services to battle Netflix and Amazon‘s Prime Video, Vinciquerra eschewed that strategy.

The veteran executive recognized that streaming profits would be several years away and he didn’t want to burden his cautious parent in Japan with billion-dollar losses.

Instead, Sony Pictures became a so-called “arms dealer” in the streaming wars, producing shows for Netflix, Prime, Warner Bros. Discovery’s HBO and Disney’s ABC. The decision ensured Sony Pictures posted big profits while others in Hollywood were reeling from financial pain and laying off thousands of workers.

Vinciquerra told The Times that such decisions boiled down to “applying common sense and logic.”

“When everyone jumped in[to streaming], I thought: Well, none of these companies can supply all of their creative needs,” Vinciquerra said in an interview. “They’re all going to be at war for subscribers. We have a great library, we have great creators on our bench, so let’s supply them so they can fight their wars. We did, and it worked.”

Sony does own a popular and profitable streaming service: Crunchyroll, which has thousands of Japanese anime titles. The subscription service has 15 million subscribers and counts more than 100 million users in dozens of countries.

Under Vinciquerra, the studio took pride in nurturing its beloved mainstays, including “Wheel of Fortune” and “Jeopardy!” However, studio leaders encountered hiccups replacing Alex Trebek as the host of America’s most popular quiz show.

Vinciquerra faced numerous challenges while leading Sony.

He joined the studio in June 2017, when it was still adrift after the catastrophic computer hack in late 2014. There had been several management shakeups and morale was low. He also presided throughout the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, which crushed the studio’s theatrical movie business, and last year’s dual strikes by Hollywood’s actors and writers.

Vinciquerra played a diplomatic role during the strikes, encouraging both the studios and the guilds to return to the bargaining table.

“We’re a very stable company,” Vinciquerra said. “I’d much rather have our hand than the hand of any of our competitors in the traditional field.”

Tony Vinciquerra, chairman and CEO, Sony Pictures Entertainment.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

For years, rumors swirled that Tokyo-based Sony had grown sour on Hollywood, speculation that accelerated after the cyberattack attributed to North Korea. Vinciquerra helped vanquish such talk by shaping the studio into a more respected part of the PlayStation maker’s global empire.

On the film side, run by Tom Rothman, box office hits in recent years have included the animated “Spider-Verse” movies, “It Ends With Us,” “Bad Boys: Ride or Die” and “Anyone But You.”

“Under Tony’s watch, SPE became a critically important part of our efforts to maximize the value of our IP and find synergies across all our entertainment and technology businesses,” Yoshida said in the statement. “It remains a key driver in Sony Group’s ongoing corporate strategies to lean further into the creative and entertainment spaces.”