On March 24, 2026, The Walt Disney Company exited its deal with OpenAI after OpenAI shut down Sora, the AI text-to-video platform that was the centerpiece of the deal.
The deal was announced on December 11, 2025. It would’ve been a three-year deal, allowing OpenAI to use over 200+
Disney, Marvel, Pixar, and Star Wars characters.
The deal was cancelled after the CEO of OpenAI, Sam Altman, shut down Sora due to declining user interest and Extreme financial losses. Sora was losing millions of dollars a day due to the massive computing resources needed to run it. Disney publicly respected OpenAI’s decision to shut Sora down, but this deal ended before it even started.
Mr. Ritchetelli, who is the Personal finance teacher of The Morgan School, believed it was a good decision to cancel the deal. “Yeah, especially if they’re not using it for all the right reasons. You know, plus it has to infringe on tons of copyright, trademark stuff. It was dangerous. Fun, but dangerous.” Mr.Ritchetelli stated.
Former CEO of Disney, Bob Iger, started discussions with OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, all the way back in 2022, discussing this big Collab that would never come to be. Bob Iger became the CEO of Disney back in 2005 and was CEO for over 20 years. During his time as CEO, he drastically changed The Walt Disney Company forever. He is the one who decided to go on a shopping spree during his time as CEO, acquiring Lucasfilm, Marvel Entertainment, and Pixar, paying 15.4 billion for all three throughout the years during his first tenure as CEO.
Even before Bob Iger was CEO, Ms.Strunjo was a super Disney fan. “I love Disney for all of the thought that they put into all the little details. So when you go down to Disney, every light fixture has a reason for it, and it’s a place for people to get out of their daily stress. You can just go enjoy a magical time with the people that you’re with without social media or daily pressures.” Ms.Strunjo happily stated.
Ms.Strunjo has been a Disney fan since she was a little kid, and loves that Disney is a company that listens to its fans and has details in the least important things.
The new CEO of Disney, Josh D’Amaro, who replaced Bob Iger on March 18th 2026, wants to improve and expand Disney theme parks and cruises with 60 billion dollars. He wants Disney theme parks to be even more magical and a place where people can just relax.
“We have the most creative, most passionate, dedicated people — and it’s because of our people that we’ll continue to create stories and experiences that our fans carry with them for a lifetime.” Josh D’maro stated.
The previous CEO, Bob Iger, first left as CEO in Febuary 25,2020 becuase he wanted to retire, but after seeing Bob Chapek get fired as CEO, he returned becuase when Chapek was CEO, there were poor financial results, and unpopular cost-cutting measures in the company, which many fans didn’t like.
Bob Iger returned as CEO in November of 2022, until he left again in March of 2026, and he is set to retire and leave Disney at the end of 2026.
Ms.Strunjo believed that this OpenAI deal could happen in the future. “This just wasn’t the right time for it, and OpenAI decided to do other things and not go forward with that. So, I mean, I’m thinking it just wasn’t the right time for this to happen,” stated Ms.Strunjo.
Disney has gone through its ups and downs, but with Josh D’Amaro now the CEO, we will see what he will do for the company, and if there will be more deals with big companies.
