Tech Moguls Gather for Billionaire Summer Camp
Vanity Fair’s Natalie Korach is reporting from Sun Valley, Idaho, this week, where media and tech CEOs are enjoying the crisp mountain air courtesy of the Allen & Company Sun Valley Conference. The host of this gathering of the elites is Herb Allen, the leader of Allen & Company, a boutique investment bank that has worked on some of the most high-profile mergers and acquisitions in Hollywood and Silicon Valley.
“I counted at least 30 private planes when I was landing,” Korach says. So far the arrivals include OpenAI CEO Sam Altman; David Zaslav, CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery; Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump; Wendi Deng Murdoch; Gayle King; and Sheryl Sandberg. Korach spotted Bing Gordon whipping around the parking lot in a Rivian, with that company’s CEO, RJ Scaringe, also in attendance.
The conference may serve as a backdrop for some awkward interactions, Korach says. For example, Apple CEO Tim Cook and Disney CEO Bob Iger have both arrived in Sun Valley: Apple is reportedly angling to take over the American streaming rights for Formula 1 racing, which are currently held by Disney subsidiary ESPN. But ESPN’s contract with F1 runs out next year, and Cook wants to add F1 to Apple’s sports deals, which include Major League Baseball and Major League Soccer. Will this jostling turn tense on the sun-soaked grounds of the Sun Valley Resort?
Branded gear is standard-issue at Sun Valley. Last year it was red windbreakers; this year it’s red vests—but by 1 p.m., when Korach checked out the scene, it was too hot to see anyone wearing one. Korach says that the sunglasses game is also heating up. Altman spoke with reporters in a pair of bright white Vuarnet Altitude sunglasses, while Alex Norstrom, copresident of Spotify, turned up in stylish specs that appear to be from Jacques Marie Mage.
We’ll have more from Korach as she pokes around Sun Valley in her rental car for the rest of the week.
Meanwhile, in New York, the local billionaire class is still coming to terms with the victory of Zohran Mamdani in the Democratic mayoral primary. Chris Smith speaks with John Catsimatidis, the owner of the venerable Gristedes grocery store chain, who says that if Mamdani delivers on his promise to open low-cost supermarkets in the city, he’ll sell or close his own shops. “If he’s giving away everything in those stores, how can I fight it?” Catsimatidis tells Smith.
Elsewhere, cooler heads are prevailing: Next week Mamdani is set to meet with a group of chief executives convened by Kathryn Wylde, the influential president and CEO of the Partnership for New York City, a powerful business group. “He’s calling up everybody I ask him to call,” Wylde says. “Jamie Dimon famously said that during eight years as mayor, [Bill] de Blasio never called him. He’s doing a lot more than Bill ever did.”
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