Sykdance Deal to Buy Paramount
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Aubrey Plaza is a cat, Barry Keoghan is an animal, Saoirse Ronan has a lamb, Andrea Riseborough battles two Skarsgårds and Paramount's tug-of-war.
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THE INDUSTRY NEWS
Sykdance ups deal to buy Paramount. The new proposal will increase the amount of money going to shareholders, who were not happy with the original Skydance deal that gave Shari Redstone, president of Paramount’s parent company, a premium $2 bn buyout.
Concurrently, the other interested party in this tug-a-war, Sony, who signed an NDA with Paramount two weeks ago after Skydance's failure to make a deal following a 30-day exclusive negotiating window, discussed their investment strategy at an event.
The CEO, Tony Vinciquerra, stated:
“We will not make investments that don’t complement our core strategy, and our strategy is to have more IP, more product, more library to sell. We’re not going to get into other businesses. We’re not going to get into a general entertainment streaming service. We’re not going to be operating other businesses that are outside the strategy that we have defined.”
Sony and Apollo Global, an asset management company, had previously offered $26 bn to buy Paramount Global, but that offer is off the table. Sony is now reviewing Paramount’s financial information before making another offer. Whatever that offer will be, Sony is only interested in the movie studio, leaving Apollo to manage or sell the other assets (like Paramount+).
Another tidbit of Sony’s strategy: AI. Vinciquerra stated:
“We are very focused on AI. The biggest problem with making films today is the expense. We will be looking at ways to…produce both films for theaters and television in a more efficient way, using AI primarily.”
The double exponential advancements of Open AI’s Sora, prove there are terrifyingly real use cases for AI in Sony’s pipeline.
Longtime CEO of Roadshow Films, Joel Pearlman, is officially stepping down.
During Pearlman’s three-decade-long career with Village Roadshow, he oversaw a diverse catalog of films with partners like Warner Bros, Lionsgate, A24, FilmNation, Village Roadshow Pictures, and many more.
Some of his credits include franchises like: