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Exclusive: Sony It will not be one of the rival parties trying to make a better bid during the election period. Paramount Following the global “Go Shop” period David Ellison’s Skydance Media’s $8 billion takeover bidThis is according to sources tonight.
With this news, Any other confirmed offers are on the table only Acquire Paramount.
Sony and Apollo Together they put forward a preliminary proposal of $26 billion. After Apollo’s sole bid was rejected, the company signed an NDA and began due diligence shortly after Paramount and Skydance’s exclusivity period ended.
Sony has reviewed its proposal after examining its books and considering potential regulatory issues, but foreign ownership restrictions in the broadcast industry and doubts about whether federal regulators would approve a merger between two major Hollywood studios still hung over the deal, and continue to do so today.
Paramount has 45 days, until Aug. 21, to consider other offers, after which it will be granted two 90-day extensions if it negotiates in good faith to reach a better deal than Skydance’s asking price. If Paramount chooses to accept the other offer, it will have to pay Skydance a $400 million termination fee.
Special Committee Paramount Global‘s board of directors will evaluate the new proposal and the risk that the deal would not pass federal oversight.
Barry Diller and his company IAC was left as a potential suitor.
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Edgar Bronfman Jr. was also interested.What’s different is that the new offer must cover Paramount as a whole, not just Shari Redstone’s controlling interest through National Amusements, which would rule out other players, such as a consortium led by Steve Paul that had been interested in buying National Amusements.
Sony was basically going after Paramount Studios with plans to cut the more burdensome parts of the conglomerate, namely CBS, MTV and other linear channels, and the Paramount+ streaming service, by auctioning them off. At the time, some industry insiders thought Apollo was eyeing Paramount’s Melrose site in Hollywood as a real estate deal. Industry insiders, talent representatives, filmmakers and content creators were nervous about the idea of losing another major Hollywood studio after 20th Century Fox was bought by Disney three years earlier. I’ve heard that the very concept of splitting up Paramount never convinced Shari Redstone’s team.
Additionally, there were concerns that the Sony-Paramount merger would result in a smaller overall number of films, with some sources telling Deadline: The plan was to stabilize the number of theatrical releases for both labels. To compete with streaming and other studios.
Sony did not respond to a request for comment.
