The summer camp for billionaires, which just kicked off in Sun Valley, has yielded some blockbuster deals over the years

The so-called summer camp for billionaires kicks off this week, as tech and entertainment industry moguls convene in Sun Valley, Idaho for the annual Allen & Co conference. 

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Among those in attendance at this year’s gathering are Apple CEO Tim Cook, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, Disney CEO Bob Iger, and Reid Hoffman, the cofounder of LinkedIn, which was acquired by Microsoft for $26.2 billion in June 0f 2016. 

Tim Cook, chief executive officer of Apple, Jeff Bewkes, chief executive officer of Time Warner, and Eddy Cue, senior vice president of internet software and services for Apple
Left to right: Apple CEO Tim Cook, Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes, and Apple senior VP of software and services Eddy Cue Drew Angerer, Getty images

The event features several days of talks about business and the economy. 

But the real action comes in the meetings, power lunches, and general chit-chat the moguls engage in between the formal sessions, which often provide the foundation to mega deals. These deals usually don’t materialize until weeks or months later, which is why an army of reporters armed with telephoto lenses stalk the area, diligently snapping pics of what could be the next blockbuster deal.

Often the photos prove nothing more than the fact that Executive A had lunch with Executive B. But with so many high-powered execs in attendance (not to mention the fact the event is hosted by an investment bank eager to broker big corporate marriages that pay big fees), it’s inevitable that some of these encounters lead to deals. 

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This year's event has plenty of interesting storylines. Jack Dorsey is at the event, as speculation swirls that this might finally be the year Twitter, the company he leads as CEO, finds a buyer. Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield is also there along with Amazon head Jeff Bezos, who is reportedly interested in acquiring the messaging service. 

Here's a recap of some of the biggest deals that have been hatched at the conference over the years. 

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Yahoo/Verizon

Harvey Weinstein, co chairman and co founder of Weinstein Co., and Tim Armstrong, chief executive officer of AOL Inc.
Tim Armstrong, chief executive officer of Oath Drew Angerer, Getty images

Verizon closed a deal to buy Yahoo for $4.5 billion earlier this summer, and morphed into Oath, a combination of Verizon partner AOL and Yahoo that encompasses 50 media and technology brands. 

During 2014's event, reporters spotted then Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer and AOL CEO Tim Armstrong having a "deep conversation" in the resort's bar. They almost shut down the place that night their discussion was so intense, and speculation began to swirl that a deal was being hammered out. 

It's hard to say whether that conversation actually revolved around a future deal. 

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AOL/Verizon

Lowell McAdam, chairman and chief executive officer of Verizon Communications,
Lowell McAdam, chairman and chief executive officer of Verizon Communications Drew Angerer, Getty images

The seeds to one of 2015’s most high-profile acquisitions were planted in July 2014 in Sun Valley.

It was there that AOL CEO Tim Armstrong and Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam had lunch together and started talking about “the way the world was going.”

Those discussions progressed over the fall, culminating with the May announcement that AOL was selling to Verizon for $4.4 billion. The combination could help telecommunications giant Verizon become a bigger player in mobile and video advertising.

As for AOL, hopefully this deal will turn out better than the last big combination it sketched out at Sun Valley: the ill-fated 1999 merger with Time Warner.

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Comcast/NBC Universal

Comcast CEO Brian Roberts
Brian Roberts, chairman and CEO of Comcast, at the Allen & Company Sun Valley Conference in 2014. Scott Olson/Getty Images

Cable company Comcast morphed into a media goliath in 2011 when it acquired a majority stake in entertainment company NBC Universal.

The deal involved months of negotiations but a key moment occurred during a secret meeting at a condo near the ninth hole of a Sun Valley golf course in 2009. According to a report in the New York Times, Jeff Immelt, the CEO of GE (which owned NBC at the time), met with Comcast COO Steve Burke and Comcast’s 89-year-old founder Ralph Roberts.

Immelt had already met with Roberts' son Brian, who was the CEO of Comcast, but he wanted to hear from the elder Roberts as well. The secret rendezvous required that Immelt dodge not only the gaggle of reporters at the event, but even his own colleague, NBC CEO Jeff Zucker, who was also at the conference but was not privy to the deal talks.

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Jeff Bezos/Washington Post

Jeff Bezos, Amazon
Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO Drew Angerer, Getty images

In August 2013, Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos surprised the world by announcing that he had acquired the Washington Post for $250 million.

One month earlier, Bezos had two three-hour meetings with Post Chairman Donald Graham at Sun Valley, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The meetings were not completely spontaneous. Allen & Co, the boutique investment bank which hosts the conference, had been hired by Graham to broker a deal and had reached out to Bezos months earlier. But the casual atmosphere of Sun Valley may have helped things go smoothly. “I named a price and Jeff agreed to pay it,” Graham later told Reuters.

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Disney/ABC

michael eisner sun valley
2011Peter Foley/Bloomberg via Getty Images

One of the largest deals ever when it was announced in 1995, Disney’s $19 billion acquisition of Capital Cities/ABC created a media and entertainment powerhouse and put Sun Valley on the map as the destination for headline-grabbing acquisitions.

The talks began when Disney’s then-CEO Michael Eisner bumped into investor Warren Buffett at the conference, according to the New York Times. Eisner asked Buffett’s opinion about whether Disney and ABC should “do something together.” Buffett apparently liked the idea and suggested that Eisner talk to Capital Cities/ABC Chairman Thomas Murphy. The three then had a brief chat which set the ball rolling for serious deal talks that took place in the weeks ahead. 

Jeff Bezos Verizon Comcast
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