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News of the retirement of Mr Malone (84) was first reported by the Financial Times. He is leaving his roles as chair of Liberty Media and Liberty Global, the FT said. It marks a big change for the business that Mr Malone himself created during a wave of telecoms and TV deregulation during the Reagan era. His fortune was founded in building up TCI, a US cable TV business that Mr Malone was hired to turn around when he was still in his 20s. He eventually sold to AT&T for a staggering $48bn (€39bn) in 1998. He then shifted to heading up Liberty Global, which he built into the world's biggest international cable company. That empire now includes businesses like the Formula One racing series and concert promoter Live Nation Entertainment. Nicknamed the ‘Cable Cowboy’, he also became the biggest private land owner in the US, including vast ranches in the American west. Mr Malone and his wife, Leslie, have said they intend to ensure the bulk of their roughly two million acres will remain open land rather than ever being developed. The businessman has said that he wants to make sure much of the land remains open in perpetuity. “We’re big into conservation,” he said. “Our biggest push right now is to make sure that the, give-or-take, two million acres we own are going to be kept open.” In Ireland, Malone was relatively little known until the aftermath of the financial crisis, when he was among a cohort of mostly US-based investors that swooped in to buy businesses and property assets at then knock-down prices. Liberty Global bought the broadband provider Virgin Media here in 2013 and added the former TV3 after buying it in a separate deal. In his own right, Mr Malone also bought up a string of Irish hotels, partnering with local operators Paul Higgins and John Lally to build the MHL Hotel Collection, which has 2,300 bedrooms in Ireland and operates the five-star College Green Hotel and InterContinental Dublin in the capital, Powerscourt Hotel Resort & Spa in Wicklow and a string of four-star properties in Dublin, Galway and Limerick. In Ireland, the Malones also snapped up trophy assets like Castlemartin Stud, the late Tony O’Reilly’s Georgian mansion and stud in Co Kildare, and the vast Humewood Castle in Co Wicklow. In his autobiography published earlier this year, the octogenarian revealed that he had turned down an offer from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg for Castlemartin. The FT reports, which cited two people familiar with the matter, said he will continue to manage his personal venture capital portfolio and retain his stake in the Atlanta Braves baseball team. Liberty didn't immediately respond to a request for comment on the report. The retirement plans were well signposted. Mr Malone stepped down from the board of Warner Bros Discovery earlier this year and in May, Liberty’s Charter Communications, the largest cable provider in the US, agreed to merge with Cox Communications. But his businesses remain active in deal-making. Earlier this month Liberty Global in the UK sold a 5pc stake in ITV. Two weeks ago, Apple struck a five-year deal with Liberty Media for exclusive television rights to Formula One races in the US. Financial terms of the agreement weren't disclosed.
