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Levin apologizes for AOL-Time Warner Merger a Decade After

January 4, 2010

New York - Former Time Warner CEO Gerald Levin, has apologized for the merger of AOL-Time Warner during his appearance with the AOL founder, Steve Case, last Monday.

“I was the CEO. I was in charge. I am really very sorry about the pain and suffering and loss that [were] caused,” Levin said. He admitted it was a mistake for the two companies to have merged.

AOL and Time Warner merged on January 2000 wherein AOL purchased Time Warner for $164 billion dollars. The stock lowered by 90 percent. But eventually AOL became a separate company again.

“I take responsibility. It was not the board. It was not my colleagues at Time Warner. It was not the bankers and lawyers—there were a lot of them. It was not Steve Case, who was a brilliant young digital entrepreneur,” he took full responsibility of what happened to the company.

He said it was comparable to GE, AIG and Citigroup. Although he had the passion in what he did, he admitted he did not have enough understanding for those working in the company.

“Vision is one thing, execution is another. If we had taken the entire senior executive team from both companies, the top 100 people and blown them up and started over with a new group. That new group, without any of the history, and any of the baggage, any of the perspectives, probably would have done a better job,” Case further added.

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