AI Summary
5 min readIt’s 4:30 in the morning in a London hotel ballroom. Carnival Cruise Line President Mickey Arison has been sitting in a hard chair for twelve hours, watching Princess Cruises shareholders count ballots by hand. The meeting was supposed to be a formality—a vote to approve Royal Caribbean’s acquisition of Princess. Instead, Arison’s team had maneuvered to adjourn the meeting, buying time for Carnival to make its own bid. When the chair finally announces that the shareholders have voted to adjourn, Arison leaves with a grin. Fifteen years earlier, Royal Caribbean CEO Richard Fain had outmaneuvered him. This time, Arison won. The fight for Princess Cruises would determine which company would dominate the seas for decades to come.
The Poison Pill and the Adjournment Gambit
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What you'll learn
- 1 (00:16) **The Princess Hostile Bid Begins** - Carnival President Mickey Arison pitches a Princess Cruises shareholder on why Carnival is a better buyer than Royal Caribbean, and reveals a legal loophole around the poison pill.
- 2 (06:51) **The Shareholder Vote to Adjourn** - At the Princess shareholder meeting, Arison faces a hostile crowd of private British shareholders who disparage Carnival.
- 3 (11:40) **Carnival Wins Princess** - The Royal Caribbean offer expires, Carnival outbids them for $7.3 billion, and Princess shareholders accept.
- 4 (12:59) **Carnival's Scandals and Arison's Ouster** - A series of disasters, including the Costa Concordia crash and the "Poop Cruise" on the Triumph, damage Carnival's reputation.
- 5 (16:52) **Post-Arison Scandals** - Carnival continues to face legal trouble, including a $40 million fine for illegal waste dumping and a $20 million fine for probation violations.
- 6 (17:52) **The Diamond Princess Outbreak** - The first major cruise ship COVID-19 outbreak begins when a passenger who boarded with symptoms tests positive after disembarking.
- 7 (21:34) **Inside the Diamond Princess Quarantine** - A Japanese health officer boards the ship to test passengers and discovers the crew has minimal protective measures, raising fears of a major outbreak.
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Guests on this episode
Show Notes
As the cruise industry enters the 21st century, Carnival and Royal Caribbean square off again as they battle to acquire British company Princess Cruises. Whoever wins Princess will be virtually uncatchable as the largest cruise company in the world. But when the Covid-19 pandemic breaks out, the cruise industry struggles to keep passengers safe, and the entire existence of the industry is in jeopardy.
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