Gerald Levin
Gerald Levin, born in Philadelphia in 1939, is the former media titan best remembered for orchestrating the disastrous AOL-Time Warner merger in 2000, a deal that is now studied in business schools as a textbook example of what not to do. As CEO of Time Warner, Levin pushed for the $164 billion merger that promised to revolutionize media and technology but instead led to one of the largest corporate losses in history. His legacy is marred by the collapse of shareholder value and his swift exit from the industry, leaving behind a cautionary tale of hubris in the dot-com bubble era.