Paramount Skydance challenges Netflix with $108.4 billion bid for Warner Bros Discovery

Streaming giant Netflix's acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery has taken a dramatic turn as Paramount, now rebranded as Paramount Skydance, has initiated a hostile takeover bid valued at $108.4 billion.

This all-cash offer represents a 139 per cent premium over Warner Bros. Discovery's stock price of $12.54 from September. Paramount has publicly stated that Netflix's bid is "inferior and uncertain."

Netflix had boldly announced that it acquired film and television studio Warner Bros. Discovery for nearly $83 billion. (R136,639,552). Paramount added a major twist by going directly to the Warner Bros. Discovery board and shareholders.

Warner Bros.' biggest competitor is Paramount Skydance, the Hollywood studio owned by Larry Ellison.

Ellison's son, David, runs Paramount, and there is talk he may lobby the White House directly to block the Netflix-Warner Bros. merger.

"WBD shareholders deserve an opportunity to consider our superior all-cash offer," said David Ellison, chairman and CEO of Paramount.

Unlike Netflix's targeted acquisition, Paramount had sought to buy Warner Bros. in its entirety, including cable networks CNN, TNT, and TBS, which are being spun off separately.

Netflix has faced fierce criticism over its blockbuster deal to acquire Warner Bros., the storied Hollywood studio.

Due to its reluctance to release content in theaters and its disruption of long-established industry practices, the streaming giant is already considered an outcast in certain Hollywood circles.

The acquisition faced a strong offensive launched by influential figures in Hollywood.

"Titanic" director James Cameron called the buyout a "disaster," while a group of prominent producers are lobbying Congress to oppose the deal, according to trade magazine Variety.

In a letter to lawmakers, the anonymous filmmakers warned that Netflix would "effectively hold a noose around the theatrical marketplace," further damaging a Hollywood ecosystem already strained by audiences' shift from theaters and TV to streaming.

"I could not think of a more effective way to reduce competition in Hollywood than selling WBD to Netflix," Warner's former CEO Jason Kilar wrote on X.

In South Africa, the deal has cast a cloud of uncertainty as local streamer Showmax has HBO Max on their platform and Netflix is a competitor to the Multichoice-owned streamer.

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