Paramount’s rumored merger with Skydance is off

[Karlston]

The parent company of CBS, MTV, Nickelodeon, and Paramount Plus is looking for a new partner after merger talks fell apart.

 

Following weeks of discussions, Paramount’s potential merger deal with Skydance has fallen apart, as reported earlier by The Wall Street Journal. In a statement on Tuesday, Paramount’s parent company, National Amusements, said the companies couldn’t “reach mutually acceptable terms” for its deal with Skydance Media.

 

One possible issue may have been Skydance’s decision not to include legal protection that would shield National Amusements head Shari Redstone from a lawsuit filed by shareholders, according to a report from The Hollywood Reporter. The WSJ reports that now, Redstone is “likely” to pursue a sale of National Amusements without trying to merge Paramount with another company.

 

Rumors about a merger with Warner Bros. Discovery emerged last year, and in addition to Skydance, a couple of other suitors have popped up since then, including Apollo Global Management, Sony, and Byron Allen. The dropped deal follows the departure of Paramount CEO Bob Bakish in April, who helmed the company for eight years. Paramount replaced Bakish with a new Office of the CEO consisting of three other executives: Chris McCarthy, Brian Robbins, and George Cheeks.

 

The company is trying to figure out its streaming service, too, which still hasn’t become profitable. Paramount Plus subscriptions grew after it aired Super Bowl LVIII, but that’s part of its link to CBS — it won’t have a Super Bowl to draw in viewers every year, and there’s only so much Star Trek and Halo can do.

 

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