Founded in 1922 by Charles Robert Allen, Jr., he was soon joined by his brothers,
Herbert A. Allen, Sr. and Harold Allen. The firm is generally regarded as a boutique advisory firm with a specific specialization in real estate and the media and entertainment sectors. Allen & Company, which since 2002 has been run by
Herbert Allen III, grandnephew of the founder, generally shies away from publicity and does not maintain a website or issue press releases, with the exception of the extensive media procured for its annual conference evidenced by its allowance of access to the conference by financial media properties such as
CNBC,
The Wall Street Journal and others to cover its event. In 1973, Allen & Company bought a stake in
Columbia Pictures. When the business was sold in 1982 to
Coca-Cola, it netted a significant profit. Since then, Herbert Allen, Jr. has had a place on Coca-Cola's board of directors. Since its founding in 1982, the
Allen & Company Sun Valley Conference has regularly drawn high-profile attendees such as
Bill Gates,
Warren Buffett,
Rupert Murdoch,
Barry Diller,
Michael Eisner,
Oprah Winfrey,
Robert Johnson,
Andy Grove,
Richard Parsons, and
Donald Keough. Allen & Co. was one of ten underwriters for the
Google initial public offering in 2004. In 2007, Allen was sole advisor to
Activision in its $18 billion merger with
Vivendi Games. In 2011, the
New York Mets hired Allen & Co. to sell a minority stake of the team. That deal later fell apart. In November 2013, Allen & Co. was one of seven underwriters on the initial public offering of
Twitter. Allen & Co. was the adviser of
Facebook in its $19 billion acquisition of
WhatsApp in February 2014. In 2015, Allen & Co. was the advisor to Time Warner Cable in its $80 billion 2015 merger with
Charter Communications,
AOL in its acquisition by
Verizon,
Centene Corporation in its $6.8 billion acquisition of
Health Net, and
eBay in its separation from
PayPal. In 2016, Allen & Co was the lead advisor to
Time Warner in its $108 billion acquisition by
AT&T,
LinkedIn for its merger talks with
Microsoft,
Walmart in its $3.3 billion purchase of
Jet.com, and Verizon in its $4.8 billion acquisition of
Yahoo!. In 2017, Allen & Co. was the advisor to
Chewy.com in
PetSmart's $3.35 billion purchase of the online retailer. == Presidents/CEOs ==