Paramount and Skydance Agree to Terms for Merger Launch

It is now official that Paramount and Skydance have agreed to terms to launch their merger, as confirmed by a CNBC report.

Here’s the lowdown: Paramount’s team, along with David Ellison‘s Skydance crew and some investors, agreed on a deal. Now they’re waiting for Shari Redstone, who’s in charge at National Amusements and owns a lot of Paramount shares, to give the final okay. This news could shake things up in the entertainment world. — Exciting, right?

After weeks of talks and a competing offer from Apollo Global Management and Sony Pictures, an agreement has finally been reached.

As per CNBC’s David Faber’s report on Monday, the deal includes Redstone pocketing $2 billion for National Amusements. On top of that, Skydance is stepping in to buy nearly half of class B Paramount shares at $15 each, totaling a hefty $4.5 billion. The neat part? Shareholders will still hold onto a piece of the pie in the new setup.

Skydance and RedBird aren’t just throwing their hats into the ring with a buyout; they’re also chipping in $1.5 billion in cold, hard cash to help Paramount sort out its debt situation. Once the dust settles, Skydance and RedBird will be running the show, snagging about two-thirds of Paramount. The rest? Well, that’s going to the class B shareholders. The Wall Street Journal let the cat out of the bag on these terms earlier.

Here’s the kicker: shareholders won’t even need to give a thumbs-up on this deal. That was all hashed out in negotiations, as Faber’s report says. Paramount’s yearly shareholder meeting is just around the corner on Tuesday, so it’s all happening pretty fast.

So, Bob Bakish stepped down as CEO in late April. Now, instead of one person at the helm, Paramount has what they’re calling the “Office of the CEO,” which is led by three big shots: George Cheeks, who’s also the president and CEO over at CBS; Chris McCarthy, running the show at Showtime/MTV Entertainment Studios and Paramount Media Networks; and Brian Robbins, the main guy at Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon.

Source: CNBC