Paramount Skydance finished its takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery on Tuesday, October 6, folding two of Hollywood’s oldest studios, two big streaming services, and two of America’s best-known television newsrooms, CBS News and CNN, into one company. The merged business now goes by the name Skydance Corporation, after the production company David Ellison founded before he took control of Paramount in 2025 and then went after Warner Bros.
The company announced the close in a press release at 8:38 a.m. Eastern time (5:38 a.m. PT), saying the deal went through after it received every regulatory approval the merger agreement required. Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders got $31.01666668 per share in cash, WBD shares stopped trading on Nasdaq, and Skydance Class B shares begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker SKYD. The BBC and Bloomberg put the deal’s value at $110 billion, while Variety and some other outlets cite $111 billion.
Ellison, the chairman and chief executive, called Tuesday historic for the whole film industry. “Our focus now turns to the future: building a company that empowers creatives, entertains audiences and rewards shareholders,” he said in the statement. Gerry Cardinale of RedBird Capital, a Skydance board member and one of the deal’s main backers, added: “David, our Co-CEO Ynon Kreiz, and the rest of our world-class Skydance team have the vision and track record to lead through this change.” Kreiz, the former Mattel chief executive, takes charge of day-to-day operations and the job of stitching the two companies together, the BBC reports, while Ellison concentrates on strategy and technology.
The combined company holds a vast catalog. The BBC lists HBO, CBS, Nickelodeon, Showtime, Comedy Central, DC Studios, and Food Network among the pieces, along with franchises such as Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, The Lord of the Rings, and Mission: Impossible. Skydance itself claims more than 200 million streaming subscribers across its platforms, nearly $70 billion in yearly revenue, more than 180 television shows, and the largest theatrical output in the industry. It promises at least 30 films in theaters each year, each with a theatrical window of at least 45 days.
The money behind the deal came largely from the Ellison family and a group of investors. Skydance says the transaction drew $47 billion of new equity in Class B stock, priced at $12 a share, led by the Ellison family, RedBird, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, Abu Dhabi’s L’IMAD, the Qatar Investment Authority, and LionTree. Bank of America, Citigroup, and Apollo led the debt financing. The Ellison family holds the largest equity stake, and together with RedBird it owns all of the company’s voting shares.
That debt now sits at the center of the company’s plans. Variety reports roughly $80 billion in net debt, and the company says it aims for more than $6 billion in yearly cost savings within three years, mostly from technology, integration and procurement, marketing, and real estate. Skydance expects more than $10 billion in free cash flow by 2030 and wants its net debt to fall to three times adjusted earnings by the end of 2029. Variety reports an estimated ratio of six to seven times this year, and it reports that thousands of employees at the former Paramount and WBD expect pink slips over the coming months.
The road to Tuesday ran through more than a year of fights. Netflix first struck a deal to buy part of Warner Bros. Discovery, then walked away after Paramount Skydance started a bidding war, the BBC reports. In July, Deadline reports, the attorneys general of 12 states, led by California, sued to block the merger on antitrust grounds, and the Writers Guild of America filed its own suit. The states settled with Paramount and Ellison in September. Skydance says competition authorities in nearly 70 jurisdictions approved the deal unanimously.
The state settlement sets rules for the next five years. According to the BBC, the merged studio must release 30 films a year for the first two years and 32 a year after that, mostly as wide releases in cinemas, plus at least four independent films a year, with guardrails against filling the quota with “AI-generated” films. If it misses the quota, it could have to sell its 49 percent stake in Miramax. At least 20 percent of film production must take place in the United States for the first two years, rising to more than 30 percent in the three years after. California Attorney General Rob Bonta, who led the suit, said the terms aim to make sure the studios produce “real, robust movies.” Variety reports that the consent decree also commits $47.5 million over five years to a workforce fund for retraining laid-off staff.
The Writers Guild settled the same day the states did. In its September 21 statement, the guild won a five-year ban on writer layoffs at CBS News Broadcast and $17.5 million for its health fund, but it did not hide its view of the merger. “We continue to believe the merger will cause damage to writers and the industry at large,” the guild said, adding that, as a nonprofit without government backing, it could not afford a solo antitrust trial. “We will continue to fight the harms of industry consolidation.”
Worry about jobs runs deep in Los Angeles. A study by the consultancy CVL Economics for Los Angeles County estimated that the merger could wipe out roughly 4,500 direct film and TV jobs and $1.26 billion in wages over three years, the BBC reports, in a region that has already lost about a third of its film and TV workforce, some 50,000 jobs, since 2022. Criminal Minds actor Kirsten Vangsness told the BBC she felt “heartbroken.” Syleecia Thompson, a business professor at National University, said the blow “hits small businesses, vendors, caterers and local communities.” Breanne Gilliam, a corporate lawyer at Maddin Hauser, put it more bluntly: “Nothing in the settlement limits layoffs.”
Viewers may feel the change in their bills. Forrester Research analyst Mike Proulx told the BBC that a combined Paramount+ and HBO Max service will almost certainly cost more for people who subscribe to only one of the two today, and analysts quoted by the BBC expect prices to rise overall, even if households that already pay for both see short-term savings. Gilliam warned that the film commitments expire: “Once those obligations expire, the company will have far more flexibility,” she said, adding: “Temporary rules cannot permanently fix a structural market shift.” The BBC points to Disney’s 2019 purchase of 21st Century Fox, after which the old Fox studio’s yearly slate of theatrical releases shrank from 12 to 17 films to three to six.
The news side draws the sharpest questions. Skydance now owns both CBS News and CNN, two networks that, the BBC notes, have faced heavy political pressure; President Donald Trump has barred CNN from the White House, and Ellison hosted a dinner for Trump earlier this year. Mark Thompson, a former BBC director general, stays on as chairman and editor-in-chief of CNN Worldwide, and Bari Weiss remains editor-in-chief of CBS News. The settlement creates a news editorial independence board, but Paramount appoints its members. Seth Stern of the Freedom of the Press Foundation called that board “worthless” and told the BBC: “The board creates the same First Amendment problems it claims to solve, the government meddling in news.” Gilliam added that “an oversight board only has as much power as the agreement gives it.”
Both studios bring long histories. Warner Bros., founded 103 years ago, has won more than 100 Academy Awards, including a record-tying 11 Oscars last year for One Battle After Another, Sinners, and Weapons, the BBC reports. Paramount traces its roots to 1912 and also counts more than 100 Oscars, from The Godfather to Titanic, though its last win came in 2022 with Top Gun: Maverick.
As of about 7 a.m. PT Tuesday, Skydance had not announced layoff numbers, a launch date for the combined streaming service, or new subscription prices, and this desk had not seen a first-day price for SKYD shares.
