Skydance and Paramount Restart Talks
It’s back to the negotiating table.
Shari Redstone’s National Amusements and David Ellison’s Skydance Media are reengaging on talks that could lead to a change in ownership for Paramount Global, a source confirms to The Hollywood Reporter.
The move marks the latest twist in a corporate soap opera that saw Redstone walk away from a deal in June that would’ve effectively merged the owner of CBS, Showtime, Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon with the multimedia production company that has co-financed Top Gun: Maverick and Mission: Impossible franchise entries.
Skydance, along with investment firms RedBird Capital and KKR, had on the table an agreement in which that group would take over Redstone’s National Amusements, which controls Paramount, and merge the company with Skydance.
David Ellison, the son of billionaire Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, launched what was originally called Skydance Productions in 2010 and has backed Paramount films including World War Z, Star Trek Into Darkness and G.I. Joe: Retaliation.
On June 11, a rep for National Amusements said that the parties had “not been able to reach mutually acceptable terms regarding the potential transaction with Skydance Media for the acquisition of a controlling stake in NAI.”
That news sent Paramount Global into another wave of uncertainty, as the company had already ousted its chief executive, Bob Bakish, and installed an “office of the CEO” led by Brian Robbins, Chris McCarthy and George Cheeks to steady the ship in the interim.
At a town hall with employees in Los Angeles on June 25, Robbins acknowledged “what a difficult and disruptive period it has been” as staffers saw headlines about the stop-and-start process and multiple suitors (including Sony’s team-up with private equity giant Apollo) while the company appeared to lose favor on Wall Street.
More to come.
