Activist investor campaigns are back at scale in 2026, with U.S. campaign activity running above four-year averages and Elliott Management and Starboard Value alone accounting for nearly three-quarters of major campaign activity in the first half of the year, according to Barclays' H1 2026 Review of Shareholder Activism. Here are ten campaigns that defined how companies communicate under activist pressure, and what worked.
1. Trian Fund Management vs. Disney (2023–2024)
Nelson Peltz's Trian Fund Management, holding roughly $3 billion in Disney stock alongside former Marvel chairman Ike Perlmutter, pushed for board seats for Peltz and former Disney CFO Jay Rasulo, citing a $71 billion Fox acquisition it called strategically flawed and demanding "Netflix-like" streaming margins of 15 to 20 percent by 2027.
How Disney fought back: Disney produced animated, character-driven videos explaining to retail shareholders why the incumbent board should stay, hosted on a dedicated microsite and distributed across social and traditional media, according to a Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance review of the campaign. Joele Frank's defense helped produce a roughly 94-to-6 shareholder vote against Peltz's board slate, one of the most lopsided outcomes in a major proxy fight in recent memory.
2. Elliott Management's 2025-2026 Campaign Surge
Elliott Management launched 18 campaigns in 2025, more than any other activist fund and responsible for five of the year's ten largest campaigns by target market capitalization, according to Barclays' 2025 Review of Shareholder Activism. Elliott led activity again in the first half of 2026 with 12 campaigns launched across large- and mega-cap targets in four countries.
The communications pattern: Elliott's public letters typically combine a detailed financial thesis with a specific, named ask, board seats, a strategic review, or a capital-return commitment, giving target companies a concrete proposal to respond to publicly rather than a vague criticism to deflect.
3. Starboard Value's Board-Seat Wins (Q1 2026)
Elliott, JANA Partners (referred to as "Engine" in some coverage), and Starboard Value together represented nearly 40 percent of board seats won through settlements in the first quarter of 2026, following agreements with Fox Factory, Phillips 66, Norwegian Cruise Line, J.M. Smucker, and Tripadvisor, according to Barclays data.
The pattern for targets: settlement, not a proxy vote, remains the dominant outcome. Barclays recorded 45 board seats won through the quarter, and 41 of them came from negotiated settlements rather than a shareholder vote, meaning most companies chose to negotiate a communications and governance resolution privately before a public fight became necessary.
4. Bill Ackman's Pershing Square vs. Herbalife (2012–2018)
Bill Ackman ran a six-year short campaign against Herbalife, alleging the company operated as a pyramid scheme, while Carl Icahn took the opposing long position. Ackman ultimately closed the short position at a loss exceeding $1 billion.
The lesson for target companies: Herbalife's communications strategy centered on sustained, factual rebuttal over years rather than a single dramatic response, a war of attrition that outlasted Ackman's public thesis. The campaign remains the reference case for how a sustained activist attack can fail even when it dominates headlines for years.
5. Carl Icahn vs. Southwest Gas (2021–2022)
Carl Icahn's Icahn Associates targeted Southwest Gas over a contested acquisition, demanding and ultimately securing the replacement of CEO John Hester along with multiple new board appointments, according to Harvard Law School's review of shareholder activism cases.
Why the target lost this one: unlike Disney's sustained multi-channel defense, Southwest Gas's response did not build the same public retail-investor coalition, and the campaign ended in a negotiated leadership change rather than a shareholder vote the company could win outright.
6. The Match Group Three-Way Activist Campaign
Match Group faced a simultaneous director contest from Elliott Investment Management, Starboard Value, and Anson, one of the more complex multi-activist situations of the 2024-2026 cycle, according to a communications-industry review of financial PR firm assignments. Ed Trissel, Eric Brielmann, and Aaron Palash advised Match Group through the contest.
Why multi-activist campaigns are harder: a target facing three simultaneous activist investors cannot use a single unified rebuttal, since each fund may have a different thesis and a different ask, requiring the communications team to track and respond to multiple narratives at once without appearing to contradict itself between them.
7. Norfolk Southern vs. Ancora Advisors
Norfolk Southern (NSC) faced a director contest launched by Ancora Advisors, part of the broader wave of rail and industrial-sector activism reviewed in 2024 communications-industry coverage of activist advisory assignments.
The sector pattern: industrial conglomerates carrying legacy corporate structures are one of three sectors, alongside energy majors and financial services firms sitting on excess capital, that dominate activist targeting globally in 2026, according to industry analysis. Companies in these sectors increasingly retain activism-specific communications counsel proactively, before a campaign is announced, rather than reactively.
8. Jack in the Box vs. Biglari Holdings (Q1 2026)
Sardar Biglari's unsuccessful "withhold" campaign at Jack in the Box was the only major proxy fight in the first quarter of 2026 to actually go to a shareholder vote, according to Barclays' Q1 2026 activism review, with eight additional major proxy fights and withhold campaigns pending for 25 board seats industry-wide.
Why most campaigns never reach a vote: the rarity of an actual vote in Q1 2026 reflects the broader 2026 pattern, most activist situations resolve through negotiated settlement because both sides generally prefer a private resolution to the cost, unpredictability, and public exposure of a full proxy contest.
9. The CEO Departure Pattern (2025–2026)
Nine CEOs resigned within one year of an activist campaign being initiated against their company in the trailing twelve months through Q1 2026, including leadership at Acadia Healthcare, Barrick, Charles River, Fortune Brands, Kyocera, SIG Group, STAAR Surgical, and Workday, according to Barclays data, roughly in line with the elevated four-year average of 10 such departures.
What this means for communications teams: an activist campaign now carries a documented, roughly one-in-ten-companies chance of ending in a CEO departure within a year, which is why boards increasingly build a succession-communications plan alongside the activist-defense plan itself, rather than treating leadership continuity as a separate question.
10. The Rise of Activist-Side Communications Specialists
Longacre Square Partners, formed in 2022, led the shareholder-activism communications space for the third consecutive year in 2024 by total investor-client representation, according to a 2024 industry review of financial communications assignments, while Gasthalter & Co., formed in 2016 by Jonathan Gasthalter, built a practice advising primarily investors and activist clients directly.
Why this matters for targets: activists now retain communications specialists with the same sophistication target companies have used for years, meaning a modern activist campaign frequently pits two professional communications operations against each other from the first public letter, not a hedge fund's press release against a company's PR department.
What These Campaigns Teach About Activist-Defense Communications
Three patterns hold across all ten cases. First, settlement is now the default outcome: most 2026 campaigns resolve through negotiated board seats rather than a shareholder vote, which means a target's communications strategy needs to support a negotiation, not just a potential public fight. Second, retail-investor-facing communications, not just institutional messaging, decided the highest-profile win in this list: Disney's multimedia, direct-to-shareholder campaign is credited as central to its lopsided vote margin. Third, the specialist tier on both sides has professionalized, with dedicated activist-side and target-side firms now representing named practices with track records, meaning companies bracing for activist pressure benefit from retaining counsel before a campaign, not after the first public letter arrives.
