Netflix’s reported acquisition of Warner Bros. might not be a done deal yet. New reporting from The New York Post speculates that Skydance and Paramount are trying to formulate a plan of attack to get shareholders to reconsider Netflix’s bid on the company.
This morning, the streamer announced their acquisition of Warner Bros. on social media and reaction has been bubbling all day. Everyone has an opinion on the largest media merger of the year. On Twitter, The New York Post’s business correspondent wrote, “As reported @paramountco @Skydance is now looking to launch a hostile bid for @wbd because it feels its $30 a share all cash offer is actually higher than what @netflix offered in terms of cash, stock and the value of the spinoff of the cable business.”
The hope for Skydance is that they can poach individual shareholders and cause the negotiation to go back to the drawing board. However, that’s a sketchy method. It could prove ineffective after such a large acquisition has been publicly acknowledged.
“They are really pissed over at Paramount Skydance,” a media executive told The Post. “They think this was a rigged deal process because of the friendship between the CEOs and they’re betting the shareholders will be pissed when they find out what went down.”
Is Netflix buying Warner Bros.?
For all intents and purposes, yes. At this moment, Netflix has secured both the funding and the blessing of the shareholders for a Warner Brothers acquisition. As we laid out earlier in this piece, Skydance is attempting a Hail Mary to try and get back into the game. They had been lining up resources for months to prepare a bid to purchase the rival studio. But, Warner Brothers ended up liking Netflix’s offer more, and that made all the difference.
“Our mission has always been to entertain the world,” Ted Sarandos, co-CEO of Netflix said earlier today. “By combining Warner Bros.’ incredible library of shows and movies—from timeless classics like Casablanca and Citizen Kane to modern favorites like Harry Potter and Friends—with our culture-defining titles like Stranger Things, KPop Demon Hunters and Squid Game, we’ll be able to do that even better. Together, we can give audiences more of what they love and help define the next century of storytelling.”
The Future of Warner Bros.
All of that sounds nice, but people online are more than skeptical of such a large merger. Consolidation of this scale usually results in layoffs, restructuring, and unintended drawbacks for consumers. Other publications already noted that Sarandos has targeted shortening theatrical windows for Warner Brothers projects. That was just the wee hours of this deal being made public.
Possibly the most dire of these details is that a sale to Skydance would also open Warner Brothers up to the kind of partisan angling that has colored their days owning Paramount. Installing Bari Weiss as the head of CBS News, greenlighting Rush Hour 4 after a request for the Trump administration, and wholesale scaling back of DEI initiatives over at The Mountain of Entertainment. The options lack zest, but time moves forward.
(Photo Credit: Mario Tama/Getty Images)
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