Edward Rogers won the war — but that victory may still yet cost his company dearly
CBC
The decision by Rogers Communications Inc. to not appeal a court decision last week handed company chair Edward Rogers a decisive victory in his battle for control of the telecom company that bears his family name.
Long-simmering tensions at the family-run company spilled out into the open last month, giving ordinary Canadians an unprecedented glimpse into the behind-the-scenes details at play with the powerful family.
While the ruling handed the keys of the castle to Edward Rogers for the foreseeable future, the costs associated with his win may make for a pyrrhic victory — making it even harder for him to fix the mismanagement and stock underperformance that he says has plagued the company for years.
The legal costs of the fight alone are not insignificant.
A handful of law firms have been conscripted for one side or the other over the past few weeks as the drama culminated in last week's ruling in a B.C. court, after a battle that laid bare the $30-billion company's unique ownership structure.
With that many legal eagles involved, veteran corporate lawyer Phil Anisman says the costs can add up quickly. On the day the verdict was read, there were nine lawyers in court, and dozens more listening into a conference call of the proceedings.
It is reasonable to assume that those in the room would charge up to $1,000 an hour for their time, said Anisman, and that's just for one day of the almost two-month-long fight.
"It wouldn't cover everything that went back to all their discussions, negotiations [and] legal advice before they decided to go to court," Anisman said in an interview.
Those legal costs may be in the rearview mirror, but a number of other major expenses still lie ahead.
The power struggle began last month when Edward Rogers, as chair of the board, attempted to dismiss the company's CEO Joe Natale and replace him with CFO Tony Staffieri. After Natale alerted the board, other family members, including Edward's sisters and mother, voted to block the move and to remove him as chair.
Edward instead unilaterally fired five members of the board, replacing them with successors of his choosing and reinstating himself as chair.
He was able to overthrow the board because of the company's dual-class share structure. More than 97 per cent of Rogers shares with voting rights attached to them are held in a family trust — a trust that's chaired by Edward.
In court filings, Edward suggests that Natale had agreed to go, and it was only in the process of negotiating the terms of his exit that things blew up. But even if the split had been amicable, Natale was poised to leave the company with an exit package that one estimate pegged at as much as $200 million.
Natale has earned a salary of just over $1 million every year since becoming CEO of Rogers in April 2017, along with an annual bonus of $1.5 million. Additionally, he's earned stock-based awards to bring his total compensation to at least $11 million every year.
