SUN VALLEY, Idaho – OpenAI kingpin Sam Altman and WarnerBros. Discovery boss David Zaslav joined dozens of the nation’s power players who jetted into this resort town Tuesday ahead of Allen & Co.’s annual “summer camp for billionaires.”
Altman, dressed casually in a T-shirt and blue slacks on a hot and sunny Idaho summer day, stopped briefly to chat with a gaggle of journalists before entering the off-limits ski lodge that will host this week’s grandiose festivities, which kick off Wednesday.
Zaslav, the 63-year-old executive tasked with salvaging the ratings-challenged CNN, chatted briefly with Hollywood producer Brian Grazer outside the lodge while sporting a head-to-toe jeans ensemble.
The initial sightings of some of the world’s most powerful tech, media and business leaders are a prelude to days of seminars, meetings and closed-door hobnobbing that have helped set Sun Valley’s reputation as a hotbed for deal-making.
Other noteworthy arrivals during the main “fly-in day” included Apple CEO Tim Cook, Paramount Global chairwoman Shari Redstone, marketing juggernaut Casey Wasserman, shorts-wearing Disney boss Bob Iger and SalesForce CEO Marc Benioff, who got into the Western setting by sporting a cowboy hat.
More than 140 flights, both private and commercial, touched down at Friedman Memorial Airport by the early evening, according to one employee, who said a more normal day of air traffic could feature as few as 10 arriving planes.
The annual billionaires’ shindig is the busiest week of the year for the area.
“Compared to Christmas, Christmas is No. 2,” the employee told The Post. “It’s all for the conference.”
At a nearby car rental desk, most vehicles had already been snapped up by out-of-towners for the week.
It remains to be seen whether this year’s conference lives up to Sun Valley’s reputation for wheeling and dealing given the difficult economic landscape that has hammered many tech and media firms this year.
This story originally appeared on NYPost
