It’s son against mother, and sisters against brother. There’s one of the world’s worst accidental phone calls. And the dirty laundry of one of Canada’s richest families has been aired out in court filings and on Twitter (where else?). Hanging in the balance is the multibillion-dollar takeover bid of a rival firm.
The slugfest over control of Rogers Communications, Canada’s largest wireless carrier, has drawn a host of comparisons: a Shakespearean drama full of twists and betrayals, a clan-vs.-clan tangle worthy of CBS soap “The Young and the Restless,” and infighting and intrigue akin to the HBO series “Succession.”
Martha Rogers, one of the protagonists of this real-life Canadian saga, has likened it instead to another HBO offering: the bloody fantasy series “Game of Thrones,” with its tyrant kings, wedding massacres and fire-breathing dragons.
On Friday, the Supreme Court of British Columbia weighed in on the long-simmering clash that recently reached a boil, riveting a nation where the Rogers name and its red-and-white logo is ubiquitous in some places and such acrimonious family backstabbing in the business world rarely plays out so publicly.
Justice Shelley Fitzpatrick granted an order sought by Edward Rogers, son of the firm’s late founder, Ted Rogers, to replace several of the board’s directors with his own picks by written resolution and without a shareholder meeting, clearing a path for him to take command of the board.
Other board members — including his mother, Loretta Rogers, and sisters Martha Rogers and Melinda Rogers-Hixon — had argued that such a move breached both the firm’s rules and Ted’s wishes.
The result was two squabbling factions of directors — each with a different chair — claiming to represent the $24 billion company, which is seeking the takeover of rival Shaw Communications
The deal, which is pending regulatory approval, could transform Canada’s telecommunications space and would help Rogers expand its footprint in western Canada. The combined firm would preside over a telecommunications and media empire that includes sports teams such as the Toronto Blue Jays.
“It’s highly unusual,” said Kai Li, a finance professor at the University of British Columbia’s Sauder School of Business. “The family is in the middle of a mega acquisition. Typically, it would be the targeted firm that implodes. … You would expect that they would be relatively well behaved.”
Edward said in a statement Friday that the court’s decision “resolves important governance issues.” But it appeared unlikely to end the drama. Stephen Schachter, a lawyer for Rogers, said the firm intended to appea
l the decision
“We believe that today’s ruling … ushers in a particularly dangerous time for [Rogers],” Loretta, Martha and Melinda said in a joint statement. “The company now faces a very real prospect of management upheaval and a prolonged period of uncertainty, at perhaps the worst possible time.”
Edward said in the statement that his family “has disagreements like every other family … I am hopeful we will resolve those differences privately, as any family would.”
The meltdown among Ted’s heirs burst into public view last month.
It began behind closed doors in September, when Edward sought to shake up the firm’s leadership by concocting a plan to replace Joe Natale, the chief executive of Rogers, with Tony Staffieri, then the firm’s chief financial officer.
Leave a Reply