Today, DISH announced that its CEO Erik Carlson will resign as President and Chief Executive Officer effective November 12th. He won’t fully leave the company as he will remain on the board of directors through the closing of the already-announced merger with EchoStar.
DISH says they plan to point Hamid Akhavan to the role of CEO and President. He is already the CEO and President of EchoStar and will oversee both companies as the merger goes forward.
Erik Carlson started off as an account executive with DISH back in August fo 1995. He worked his way up to vice president of sales and retail services in 2005. He was promoted to president and chief operating officer in 2015 to become the president and chief executive officer in 2017 and has been there until now. He has a bachelor’s from Bradley University in 1991.
This all comes as DISH announced its 3rd quarter 2023 earnings and reported that DISH and Sling TV lost 64,000 subscribers. This is great news as Sling TV has turned around recent losses and added customers in the 3rd quarter of 2023.
Sling TV added lost 117,00, and DISH lost 181,000 subscribers. In total, DISH now has 8,840,000 pay TV customers between the two brands, down from 8,904,000 during the same period in 2022. Sling TV now has 2.12 million subscribers, and DISH has 6.72 million subscribers.