As head of specialty channel behemoth Alliance Atlantis Communications Inc., Michael MacMillan was one of Canada's most powerful media moguls. He sold the company for $2.3-billion in 2007, generating a personal fortune, part of which he invested in a charitable foundation (Samara) and a winery (Closson Chase, in Ontario’s Prince Edward County, east of Toronto).
Now, he's returned to the media business, having set up Blue Ant Media Inc. to take a stake in GlassBox Television Inc., a small outfit with a handful of specialty television channels and ambitious plans to distribute programming over the Internet and hand-held devices.
When you sold Alliance Atlantis, did you think that eventually you’d be back in the media game?
No. There was no intention to get back into the business world, let alone the media area. [I had] 29 years with a front-row seat on an industry that was changing. [I] got to watch the introduction of portable cameras and videotape and privately owned TV stations, and then satellites and cable channels, and then new things like video cassettes and DVDs and the Internet. So after a fun long ride like that and selling at the right time, I didn’t know what I was going to do next.
What changed in recent months to make you want to get back in?
It was three things. One is that technology keeps changing, and [those] changes make it easier for people to listen to, watch and read information and entertainment as they wish. So the pie is actually growing. Number two, there has been an enormous amount of vertical integration and horizontal consolidation in the Canadian media industry. In a growing, diversifying media landscape with the consolidation of media owners, that spells opportunity. And then thirdly, GlassBox was an interesting company that began online and moved into broadcasting. It straddles both the old and the new world and is small and nimble.
What are expansion plans for your new media group?
I want to grow it, which means launching new products. It probably means buying or investing in other businesses as well, but I’d be exaggerating if I could tell you with any kind of precision what the detailed path is. It’s really early days, but I am confident that the media world is growing. It’s the opposite of being in the horse and the buggy business in 1910.
Is this what it was like when you started Atlantis back in 1978?
Atlantis started as a teeny little company, [with] two partners and $300 of startup capital and no relevant experience. It was fantastic. By the end, we had 1,200 employees and it was like a big enterprise. So going back to being small [means] you can zig and zag far more easily than when you’re on the prow of a big ship, where you have to be far more cautious.
Do you miss running a big company?
I don’t miss the quarterly conference calls and the short-term pressure and focus. And by the end the company was big and it was hard to think of new activities, projects or products that would move the needle. That meant there were lots of smart, good, neat things you wouldn’t do because they were too small.
On the other hand, as a big company, there were lots of great people and resources. You could make things happen quickly. That was fun.
Also, I’ve had the good fortune of not being in the business world between 2007 and 2011. That was a great four years to be out of it. Our deal [to sell Alliance Atlantis] closed on August 16, 2007, at five o’clock and the credit markets were shuddering just before that. The next morning a major financing for a big media company failed to close. Two or three days later you couldn’t finance anything in the credit markets.
