Paramount Bid: Netflix & Warner Bros. Takeover?

Just three days after Netflix and Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) closed a deal worth $82.7 billion including film and television studios HBO Max and HBO, billionaire David Ellison’s Paramount Skydance launches a hostile takeover bid that also includes WBD’s cable services (CNN, TBS and HGTV) worth $108.4 billion, including debt.

The proposals of Netflix y Paramount Skydance They differ in several aspects. Paramount’s all-cash offer values $30 each share of the companycompared to the $27.75 of the company’s proposal co-directed by Ted Sarandos. However, it covers more assets than last week’s transaction included.

In the event of confirming the offer of Paramount Skydancethis would not only cover his studies of film and television, HBO Max and HBO (including its entire catalog of series and movies), but would also cover traditional cable channels as CNN, TNT, Cartoon Network o la propia Discoverywhose “independence” was planned for the third quarter of 2026.

Key for the operation to come to fruition will depend on the American president, Donald Trumpwho has confirmed that he will actively participate in the review of the process. “The agreement could be a problem. They have a very large market share. And when they have Warner Bros., that share increases a lot. So I will participate in that decision,” said the president about the Netflix offer.

Paramount Skydance’s proposal is closer to the interests of the Trump. Ellison’s company is backed by the fund of Jared Kushnerson-in-law of the US president, and investment vehicles Qatar, Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia, which according to media such as El País “maintain excellent relations with the tenant of The White House.” In addition, Trump already actively supported Skydance’s purchase of Paramount for $8 billion in July 2024, which included such valuable assets as CBS, MTV, Nickelodeon and Comedy Central.

“WBD shareholders deserve the opportunity to consider our superior cash offer for their shares across the company. Our tender offer, which is on the same terms that we offered privately to the Warner Bros. Discovery Board of Directors, provides superior value and a safer, faster path to completion. We believe that WBD’s board of directors is pursuing an inferior proposal that exposes shareholders to a combination of cash and stock, an uncertain future commercial value of Global Networks’ linear cable business, and a regulatory approval process. complicated. We are taking our offer directly to shareholders to give them the opportunity to act in their own interest and maximize the value of their shares,” he commented. Ellison by presenting the hostile takeover bid, convinced that the path to the construction of the next great media empire will be complexbut with the security of those who have great allies supporting him.