Billionaire Media Magnate, Sumner Redstone Dies at 97

“My goal is to be number one. I would like to be number in anything I did. I don’t say I can be. I don’t say I should be. I’m saying I would like to be.” – Sumner Redstone, 1994

Media mogul, Sumner Redstone, who said ‘content is king’ died on Tuesday at age 97. His death was officially announced by his family’s holding company, National Amusements Inc., on Wednesday.

“Sumner was a man of unrivaled passion and perseverance, who devoted his life to his belief in the power of content. With his passing, the media industry he loved so dearly loses one of its great champions,” National Amusements said in a statement.

During his days alive, especially at the beginning of building his family’s fortune, Redstone singly transformed his family’s movie-theater company into a world-class media empire spanning across movies, television, radio, and books.

Mr. Redstone’s rise to fame in the entertainment industry happened late in life, having a background of humble beginnings. He was among the group of media moguls who shaped the media scope into what it is now, through strategic mergers and investments, and creative litigation with all ruthlessness.

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His media deals, mergers, and acquisitions span across ViacomCBS, Paramount’s television and movies studios, the video rental chain Blockbuster, the publisher Simon & Schuster, and cable channels that included MTV, Nickelodeon, and Comedy Central

Until the time of his death, Redstone was the controlling shareholder for ViacomCBS. He also served as executive chairman of the two companies until 2016, when shareholders pressured him with a lawsuit to drop, challenging his mental health. Redstone had countlessly said that he would never retire and would live forever.

After stepping down from ViacomCBS, Redstone faced a series of legal and public relations issues in relation to his media empire. Warner Brothers distributor Barry Reardon in 1994 said about Redstone’s ferocity that “being a competitor of Sumner Redstone’s is a fate worse than death.”

According to Forbes Redstone was worth $3 billion until the time of his death. The New York Times valuates the worth of his media empire to be $80 billion.

Summer Redstone Background

Sumner Murray Redstone was born on May 27, 1923, in Boston. He was a graduate of Harvard College and became the World War II codebreaker. On retirement from the military, Redstone returned to school where he obtained his law degree from Georgetown and Harvard law schools, respectively. He worked secured a job to work with an assistant U.S. attorney and the tax division of the Justice Department.

In 1954, Redstone joined his father’s media company, National Amusements. In 1967, he was made CEO of the company