The plan is Skydance buys National Amusement with its stock for $2.4 billion. This in turn will give them the ability to merge Skydance and Paramount via various stock transactions with Paramount Class A stockholders getting $23 per share while Class B stockholders will get $15. On the Skydance side, equity holders will get Paramount Class B shares valued at $15 per share.
Once the company merges, David Ellison from Skydance will become the new chairman and CEO with ex-NBCUniversal chief Jeff Shell acting as president. It has not been said what will become of three executives that are currently running the "Office of the CEO" for Paramount.
The around $8 billion for the sale is coming from Ellison's family and Redbird Capital Partners collectively forming the Skydance Investor Group. The resultant share makeup after the merge will be this group owning 100% of Class A shares and 70% of class B shares. The previous deal was nixed over concerns of shareholders suing but since this deal gives them a premium value on their stock (currently around $12). The deal has to go through regulatory approval which could take around a year. Additionally another bidder has 45 days to come in with better offer that Redstone could accept.
“In 1987, my father, Sumner Redstone, acquired Viacom and began assembling and growing the businesses today known as Paramount Global,” Redstone said. “He had a vision that ‘content was king’ and was always committed to delivering great content for all audiences around the world. That vision has remained at the core of Paramount’s success and our accomplishments are a direct result of the incredibly talented, creative, and dedicated individuals who work at the company. Given the changes in the industry, we want to fortify Paramount for the future while ensuring that content remains king. Our hope is that the Skydance transaction will enable Paramount’s continued success in this rapidly changing environment. As a longtime production partner to Paramount, Skydance knows Paramount well and has a clear strategic vision and the resources to take it to its next stage of growth. We believe in Paramount and we always will.”
Skydance buying the company is probably the best possible outcome for Star Trek fans as they made two of the Kelvin universe Star Trek films. While its no guarantee that Star Trek TV will continue, its much more likely now than it would have been under any other buyer. The only real reason we have enjoyed the last 5 years of new content is because of Paramount owning Paramount+, CBS Studios, and other companies that made producing the shows more cost effective. Other potential buyers wanted to sell the company for parts ending any reason to fund Star Trek programming. Early indicators are that while the merged company will still sell parts of Paramount, its going to part of a large strategy and not just to make as much money as possible selling the parts before folding the company itself while retaining intellectual property which is what would have happened under a Sony purchase (see Disney and their purchase of 20th Century Fox).
So what does this mean for Star Trek right now? Nothing. Likely budgets for everything in Paramount is going to remain locked down for the next year until new leadership comes in to decide the changes they will make. Whatever is in the pipeline will remain in motion and whatever was about to be put in motion will probably be put on hold unless its such that a decision needs to be made sooner than later. In the meantime, Paramount will probably continue to move ahead with trying to cut $500 million from their overhead which means some layoffs now and likely more later after the merge.
No comments:
Post a Comment