John C. Malone

John C. Malone (born march 7 1941 in Milford, Connecticut) is the current chairman of Liberty Media and CEO of Discovery Holding Company. He was the interim CEO of Liberty Media until succeeded by former Oracle CFO Greg Maffei. Dr. Malone graduated with the class of 1959 from Hopkins School in New Haven, Connecticut. He was a Phi Beta Kappa and merit scholar at Yale University where he obtained a B.A. in Electrical Engineering and Economics in 1963. He also received a Master of Science in Industrial Management from Johns Hopkins University in 1964 and a Ph.D. in Operations Research from Johns Hopkins in 1967. He is one of the most powerful persons in US media. Malone was also Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of TCI. Previous to that, from 1973 to 1996, Dr. Malone served as President and CEO of TCI. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Bank of New York, the Cato Institute, Expedia and The Nature Conservancy. Additionally, Dr. Malone is Chairman Emeritus of the Board for Cable Television Laboratories, Inc. and Chairman of Liberty Global, Inc., and the DirecTV Group.

Dr. Malone began his career in 1963 at Bell Telephone Laboratories/AT&T in economic planning and research and development. In 1968, he joined McKinsey & Company and in 1970 he became Group Vice President at General Instrument Corporation (GI). He was later named President of Jerrold Electronics, a GI subsidiary.

He served as Director of the National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA) from 1974 to 1977 and again from 1980 to 1993. During the 1977-1978 term, Dr. Malone was the NCTA's Treasurer.

Personal style

Despite his prosperity and influence, Malone is personable and quietly spoken and reportedly often stays at truck stops while traveling in his camper van. However, in business dealings, he is nicknamed "Darth Vader", a reputation gained while the head of TCI, where he demanded equity positions in cable programming services in return for carriage, and attempted to defeat the must-carry rules which protected broadcasters, which the cable industry eventually lost in 1997 at the US Supreme Court.

External links

* [http://www.forbes.com/finance/lists/10/2004/LIR.jhtml?passListId=10&passYear=2004&passListType=Person&uniqueId=ZP8G&datatype=Person Forbes.com: Forbes World's Richest People]
* [http://www.forbes.com/2001/07/11/0711malone.html Forbes.com: Cable's Darth Vader Is Back]