The streaming market is being re shaped, yesterday Amazon Prime announced major layoffs now National Amusements the Company that controls Paramount+ and the Ten network in Australia is on the blocks with a market capitalization of A$14.5 billion being discussed.
Shari Redstone the majority shareowner in National Amusements, the holding company that controls struggling media giant Paramount Global, has put the business up for sale and that could see the Ten Networking being taken over by a new owner along with the Paramount streaming operation.
National Amusements, owns a 10% stake in Paramount Global, they also control 77% of its voting shares and as much as 50% of its market value according to analysts at CES 2024.
“She wants out and it’s just a case of her getting the highest bid” said an analyst at CES.
BDT Capital Partners, the bankers for Redstone, the 69-year-old daughter of late media baron Sumner Redstone, have begun circulating nondisclosure agreements to private-equity firms in an effort to ascertain interest in the business.
Both Warner and Discovery have already expressed interest in the business.
“I think she would prefer to sell all of it instead of just the holding company,” a source close to Redstone said, noting that talks to sell Paramount Global itself haven’t yet borne fruit. “But there might not be a bid out there.”
Paramount Global — whose movie studio is behind the “Mission: Impossible” and “Transformers” franchises, and also owns CBS, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and MTV — ended Wednesday with a market capitalization of $9.4 billion, giving National Amusements’ shares in the company a face value just shy of $1 billion.
The Wall Street Journal reported that Skydance, the Hollywood studio that co-produced “Top Gun: Maverick” with Paramount, is in talks for an all-cash bid for National Amusements, with Skydance CEO David Ellison getting backing from his tech tycoon father, Oracle founder Larry Ellison.
Ellison is angling to buy at least a majority stake in National Amusements with an eye toward merging his studio with Paramount, according to the paper.
Shari Redstone’s stake could be worth considerably more given the voting shares’ control over Paramount.
National Amusements have declined to comment.
Last year Paramount Global CEO Bob Bakish met with Warner Bros Discovery CEO David Zaslav recently to discuss a potential merger.
