BET's $3B Viacom Sale

A story about how Bob Johnson built BET (Black Entertainment Television) and his subsequent divorce drama.

"Bob Johnson starts BET with $15,000 of his own money and gets $500,000 from a guy named John Malone. His pitch was there's no cable network, no channel that caters towards Black Americans. They had music, award shows, culture - BET becomes a winner.

He sells BET to Viacom for $3 billion, which was an incredible outcome. After everything settles, Bob Johnson is worth about $1.3 to $1.5 billion. He diversifies, puts money into real estate, owns hotel chains, and various cash-heavy assets.

Then he gets divorced and his wife gets $400 million out of the $1.3 billion awarded to her in the judgment. Here's the crazy part - she marries the judge who made the ruling.

After this, he buys the NBA team the Bobcats for $300 million. He's losing 20-25 million a year operating it, loses another $200 million in operating expenses. He hires Michael Jordan to run the team, but Bob is getting stretched for cash with too much debt. He's about to lose his entire empire because he can't pay off his note.

That's when MJ comes in and says 'I'll buy it for $275 million valuation, but I'll only put down $25 million in cash and assume all the debts of the team.' This relieves the pressure on Bob, and now Jordan is about to sell this same team for $2 billion."