Diversity in Silicon Valley. First, disney announcing that it will soon offer sports programming and its films and tv shows directly to consumers with two, new streaming services. Sales and profits fell due to the companies Cable Tv Division where subscribers and ad sales track. We sat down and talked about the companys streaming plan, and the company as a whole. Were seeing a shift in the way that people are consuming media. It is becoming more appbased. A lot of appbased consumption is done with direct to consumer services. You need the technology to do this as well, and that is no easy task. It is not simple. Especially when it comes to streaming live sports, we have consumption at a large level, and it is done all at once. So, we have accelerated our purchase of controls that we can move into this space at a faster pace and a faster rate than we initially anticipated, because we see the opportunity in the marketplace. The brands, the marketplace, and the consumer trends. You really do focus on the consumertoconsumer experience. More specifically, who was the target audience for these services . You are looking at the sports fan on the support side and with usb and as well. Espn is one of the most popular sports programming out there. Espn obviously provides a lot of live sports programming. So, we are looking to provide it as a streaming service to a Large Consumer base with an easy to understand ui. We basically reach everyone, and it is not just in the united states. It is worldwide. We are going to serve that sports fan well. Live sports has always been a mainstay although it back to broadcast television. Certainly, everyone knows of it through cable. Because of that, cable providers have been very reliant upon espn. What do you expect the reaction to be from cable distributors . We will continue to distribute the espn linear channels. The distributors and programmers alike have been experiencing the disruption that the home market is seeing and multiple businesses are seeing from advancements in technology and changes to Consumer Behavior because of that. We feel we need to react accordingly. My thoughts are that the distributors will look at this change as a threat over anything else, but it is not intended to be that. We taking advantage of Market Conditions and the passion around our brand. We are taking advantage of the technology that allows us to reach our consumers directly. If you look at disneys businesses, most all of our product is distributed to consumers through thirdparty distributors. This is an opportunity for us to reach the consumer directly, and that is an important step for the company in terms of growth. When a ceo like you makes an important decision like this, you have to ask yourself if you are going to build it or buy it. Did you go through a similar decision process . Why did you decide to build it rather than buy it . Well, in some ways, it is a buy as well. We are buying the Technology Platforms to allows to get into the space as it is faster than if we would have built it. We have the financial wherewithal to do a number of things, but this seemed to be the best that for the Walt Disney Company and our shareholders in terms of creating a Growth Strategy and really growing the company longterm. To do a longterm view which is very important, but also addressing the nearterm issues we are seeing which is all about the disruption created by digital technology. In the espn app, you have some major sports in here. However, i do not see the nfl at this point or the nba. Are there plans to add them at this point . At what terms do you expect to get them in . We do expect the license this at to the other sports which have not already licensed. This creates an opportunity for us to monetize in more effective ways through subscription revenue as well as advertising revenue and all the way that a direct to consumer relationship can generate. I think we can expect that this product is going to be in the marketplace and licensed more aggressively from multiple sports organizations. Possibly including the nfl and nba where we have great relationships. You say that you are planning a significant investment in movies and shortterm content for the disney app. Are we talking about an investment we have seen from other Companies Like hbo or netflix recently . I cannot really comment on what amazon has been investing in, but netflix has been investing will you dollars in original content which they have done rather effectively. Hbo produces content little more akin to that. We are going to produce original movies and Television Series specifically for this disneybranded service. It will be very similar to the investments we have been making in television and movies in the past. Emily that was david westin speaking with disneys ceo bob iger. Two companies are teaming up to feature Marriott Hotels on alibabas travel site. China is now the Worlds Largest source of outbound travelers who spent over 100 billion in 2016 sparking changes over the Global Tourism industry. Coming up, a talk about a former google employees memo against diversity. This is bloomberg. Google has fired the engineer who wrote a controversial memo about diversity in the Tech Industry. Emily chang spoke with the auther of that memo about diversity in Silicon Valley. It is hard to regret it, because i do believe it. Im trying to make google and the world, in general, a better place. I do not want us to be confined to our ideological echo chambers where only one side of the story can be heard and is totally intolerant to other viewpoints and Scientific Evidence. Emily what Scientific Evidence are you talking about . In followup to your piece there has been plenty of discussion about this. The fact that there is no research to support this idea that there are biological causes for the lack of women in tech or leadership positions. I spoke with megan smith who works at google. She says this is a myth. Among psychologists there is a consensus that testosterone does affect a lot of personality traits. In particular, our interest in people versus things. I am not saying that all men are one way and all women are another, but there is a different does to be shipped in personality traits which are different between men and women. There are many capable women in google, and im not try to say that any of them are not worse than average male engineers at google. I was just trying to address why we do not have equal or presentation from the population. Emily we have a very impassioned response to this. It said, if the memo was about black people or latinos or the lgbt community, you would not have anyone defending you. What do you think of that . I think that is a false analogy, and she is trying to rope me in with racists and bigots, and i am not. That seems to me more try this mirror my image rather than respond to the evidence. Very few responses have been about looking at the science. They have just been calling me names. Or the original leaked document did not carry any references which my original document did. Emily dont you think these conclusions extend to women and minorities and other types of people. Google is making products for the world. Dont you need to have all kinds of people making those products . I support diversity and inclusion, and i think also that our lack of ideological diversity has hurt our products. It makes us think, for example, just the start that all conservatives are stupid. That is widely held within our leftleaning circles. That was the former google employee speaking with only chang. We have another statement from google. Our goal is to build great products which make a difference in our users lives. The ideas that a group of our colleagues have traits that make them less by leslie suited for that work is offensive and not ok. Is this a rare occurrence . What do you think the writer wanted to achieve by this . The Panel Meeting is a weekly google meeting that typically takes place on fridays, but it will now be moved to thursday and it will be a hotly debated meeting. Many are interested about what the ceo has to say about this. He cut his break away short so that he could spend time on this. The questions that they will want to address at the meeting, and it seems that they are very interested in how can we make sure that google is a place that is comfortable for everyone . That it is a place where employees can express their views without being fired which is a concern that that former employee brought up in his memo. You think there might be some way to ease the concerns that were even brought up at the Shareholder Meeting earlier in this year where shareholders felt that perhaps conservatives are not welcome at google . If you talk with people who are supporters of that former google employee, there is this idea that there is a sort of silent minority of conservatives which really do not feel safe speaking of about their political points of view which is because they are not commonly held at google. Silicon Valley Companies tend to lean to the left, and that has had an effect in how they have dealt with issues like suppression of content. It extends a little further than just one engineer and his time at google. A tech giant is making its debut in the Corporate Bond market. This comes as elon musk is making plans for a more Affordable Electric car. The auto company is planning to support new bonds to support the spending on its new electric car. Musks crumbs and 1. 4 billion in cash in the second quarter. On the hunt for more deals. We will discuss what is next for the funded. Highlights from our exclusive interview with the finance minister. What he is promising a big change, and what that could mean for tech giants doing business in that country. This is bloomberg. Emily japanese tech giant softbank reported earnings this week. It is good news for softbanks chairman who is on the hunt for more deals and investments. The billionaire is in the process of creating 100 billion Division Fund to speed up investments in technology abroad. He says he is mulling over various deal offers including from sprint and tmobile. Bob odonnell joins us to explore the options. I think that is exactly what we are seeing in do. He has talked about this for years. Ironically, i worked for a company he bought 25 years ago he first started this vision of building up media. Watching him over the years and seeing this vision evolved, he is driving himself to be sort of the tech giant version of a Warren Buffett. He is creating this conglomerate of all these Component Companies which he sees as being critically important to driving this vision into the future. I do think it is a smart plan. Not all of the investment are going to work come up i think he is putting them in the places. Emily cory, Warren Buffett of asia. What you think of that . I mean, come on. This is taking on enormous amounts of debt with tremendous risks on that debt. If you watched the way the ceos traded in sprint over the years, he would see that it has brought them to the edge of bankruptcy over and over again. These are big swings at the fences. Anything but low valuations, he has a lot of debt to do with. He is using some connections to make these deals happen. Think in the interests in the trump tower, visiting president elect donald trump announcing the amount of jobs he will create. At the same time, he is still thinking about that tmobile merger that the Obama Administration had said was not good for u. S. Consumers. He felt that his personal appeal to donald trump might get that deal through, and now we are still talking about this. Emily bob, there is some discussion if he could coopt these deals. It is very ambitious. To be clear, im not saying he is a Warren Buffett, but that his goal is to be a Warren Buffett. His approach is not on value. His approach is building and buying these core components. Arm is the semiconductor rp company that has this incredible amount of inputs that most people do not recognize. He is buying telecom, robotics, a lot of Core Technologies which he thinks can be driven forward. I think he is being smart in developing a vision. He has what he calls his 300 year plan which is a bit overkill, but even having a 25 or 30 year plan is a big deal these days. I think he is making bets based on those decisions. Emily how do you see a tmobile merger playing out . Well, there is this notion of 5g and what that sort of means. How the landscape of more than half the u. S. Mobilephone market is basically between two companies with virtually the same market share at t and verizon. Now, when it comes to 5g, things could be very different in terms of who has the spectrum and who does not. Maybe there is a chance to sort of rewrite the market share pie chart in the world of 5g. I is worth noting that he wants to be number one and is not satisfied with being number three. I think, as u. S. Consumers, we think about it in terms of how the government is looking at this. What he wants is to be number one. He does not want u. S. Consumers to necessarily have the best choices. He does not necessarily want u. S. This is is to have the best options. Want u. S. Businesses to have the best options. So, we could have fewer providers in the u. S. Providing fewer services in the world of 5g when so Many Technology services will be based on the availability of 5g. With fewer competitors, we know prices will be higher. So what does that mean for businesses and consumers going forward, and will be Trump Administration care about that . Emily bob, this would not just be another big tech deal, but it could impact directly hundred of millions of customers. Yes, it could. You will need to get all of those leases together. The charter peace as well as the tmobile and sprint pieces in order to be competitive against the other two. So, there is that question of if he can really pull it off. I think with the previous administration, there was that mental pressure early on. However, cory raises some good points. Or are going to be challenges to the consumer. There are going to be challenges to the consumer, and other governmental entities may step down to say this is too big to make happen. Emily cory, we heard talk about that Division Fund still being raised. What do you think of that . We are going to start to see perhaps how they recognize those from an accounting basis. If you look at the history of sprint, you will see a couple of bets which have paid off fantastically in the venture category. Whether it was alibaba in china or yahoo japan, there were such great returns from those investments. You can see what he has some stars in his eyes and that he wants to pull that off again. Emily that was bloombergs cory johnson and bob odonnell. Coming up, a discussion on the companys latest earnings report. How they were able to turn the corner after the surprise ousting of their former ceo. All episodes of Bloomberg Technology are Live Streaming on twitter. This is bloomberg. Emily welcome back to the best of Bloomberg Technology. Im emily chang. Shares of lending club surged the most in two years this week. This came after the san franciscobased Company Posted its second highest quarterly revenue in history, seeing that revenue spike 35 yearoveryear to 139 million. The improved figures come about one year after the former ceo was ousted after the board found problems with lending practices and his lack of disclosure surrounding personal investment. The ceo Scott Sanborn joined us for an exclusive tv interview to discuss the future of the company. Scott it has really been about investing in the business and putting in the right controls and putting investors back in the platform. A critical piece of that is the banks and we announced in q2, 44 of our money came from banks to fund the loans on the platform. Emily when it comes to the scandal, do you feel like the company is back in a good place . Is it completely behind you . Scott i think with the results we delivered this quarter and what we talked about, having our investors back on the platform, are clear signs that we are looking ahead. Emily your main competition is credit card companies. No small opponent to take on. Where are you gaining ground . Scott so, if you look at what is happening with the Broader Market right now, there is over a trillion dollars in outstanding credit card debt. Over half of americans have had debt in the last 12 months. If you have not paid off your credit card and you have a loan, it is probably not a good one. We make it easy for them to save on average 24 on interest versus that product. That is the core audience were going after. Emily there is also the suggestion that lending standards could be getting looser where do you think we are in the cycle . 100 trillion in outstanding credit card balances is as much as it was before the financial crisis. Scott it is actually higher. It is higher. One of the powerful things about our model is that we make all of the performance on our loans publicly available so investors can see every loan we have ever issued over 100 credit attributes for that loan. What it looks like, but also, what is the payment history . What we are seeing, we did see deterioration in credit performance about 18 months ago. We talked about it and took swift action. What we see right now is stabilization in performance and our loss rates and our forecasted returns for investors remain in line. Emily when do you think we will see things turn . Will we see things turn . Scott so that is obviously pretty hard to predict. What you are hearing now is