Emilio Azcarraga Jean flexes his muscle

      By Jose Cancela

Boy that did not take long. It was just a few short weeks ago that Televisa and Univision made up, and now we are starting to see that Emilio not only picked up his Univision ownership at pennies on the dollar, but he also got himself a few extra perks. The first being the keys to the Univision news division, not a bad perk by any standards.

Consider this; Univision News is the most watched news program by Hispanics here in the states. It is the home to such marquee names as Jorge Ramos and Maria Elena Salinas, not to mention that it is the Univision news division that produces all the political and public affair specials for the network.

Out is Univision television veteran of 25 plus years Alina Falcon and in is Emilio’s longtime confidant; Isaac Lee. Isaac is a publisher extraordinaire who understands the U.S. Hispanic market and who in his latest role was Editor in Chief of Poder magazine published by Editorial Televisa. In that role he showed that we can elevate the conversation beyond the traditional issues.

It will be refreshing to watch his vision jump from the pages of a magazine to become real life stories and very much needed thought starters for our marketplace.

This move while executed with lightning speed should not come as a surprise, and will be one of many moves that we will see in the coming months and years as Azcarraga consolidates his power over Univision.

If you have any doubts about Azcarraga Jean’s ability to consolidate his power over time at Univision, just ask his cousin “El Guerro” Burillo Azcarraga. He was once the heir apparent to the Televisa organization, he clearly thought that he would take the reins of Televisa upon the death of Azcarraga Jean’s father who was the Patriarch, Chairman and CEO of the Televisa Empire. In his wildest of dreams, El Guerro never imagined that his little cousin could make a run for the top spot at Televisa and push him out. Well, we know how that story ended.

Congratulations to Isaac Lee.

Jose Cancela is Principal of Hispanic USA Inc, a Hispanic Market Resource firm. He is also the author of “The Power of Business en Espanol, Seven Fundamental Keys to Unlocking