One Merger To End Them All

Good morning: In today's edition of The Industry, we look at:

Shari's choice, 300 2.0, ​Elle Fanning​ becomes Prey, Sarah Snook's meltdown, Killer Films bodyswap, and allegorical dogs.

Let’s go!

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ONE MERGER TO END THEM ALL

We still don’t know what Shari Redstone (majority shareholder of Paramount) is doing.

But as of now, the Skydance, RedBird, and KKR consortium have ​agreed​ to initial deal terms to acquire Paramount:

• $2 bn for Shari Redstone

  • E.g., buying her stake in National Amusements (Paramount’s parent company)

• Skydance buys nearly 50% of Class B shares for $15/share

  • $4.5 bn total

• $3 bn in cash to reduce Paramount’s debt

  • $1.5 bn from Skydance

  • $1.5 bn from RedBird

If this closes, the ownership of the company, which will remain public, would breakdown as follows:

• 66%

  • Skydance & RedBird

• 33%

  • Paramount's Class B shareholders

The leadership team would tentatively be as follows:

• Paramount/Skydance Studios CEO

  • David Ellison (current CEO of Skydance)

• Paramount Global/CBS

  • Jeff Shell, executive RedBird (former CEO NBCUnivesal)

  • Jeff Zucker, Executive RedBird (former president of CNN)

The total deal is valued at $8 bn.

A National Amusements spokesperson stated:

“We received the financial terms of the proposed Paramount/Skydance transaction over the weekend and we are reviewing them.”

No word on when Redstone will make a decision.

Two possible yet unlikely targets: