Media Son of Oracle boss buys Paramount
Paramount is one of the names that made Hollywood great. The company will now be owned by 41-year-old film producer David Ellison and his billionaire family.
Ellison prevailed in months of negotiations. He and his partners are investing more than eight billion dollars in the takeover. At first glance, Paramount's share structure made it easy to gain control of the group.
More than three quarters of the shares with voting rights belonged to the previous owner Shari Redstone. In theory, it would have been enough just to take over her share. But then the many owners of non-voting shares would have been threatened with legal action if they felt disadvantaged.
Complex billion-euro deal
According to the deal announced by Paramount, Redstone will receive 2.4 billion dollars for its shares. At the same time, Paramount will merge with Ellison's production company Skydance Media.
In addition, Ellison, his family and participating investors will raise a further 4.5 billion dollars to buy out non-voting shareholders. Finally, they will pay another 1.5 billion dollars to reduce Paramount's debt.
The 41-year-old Ellison will become the new Paramount CEO after the deal is completed. His father is Larry Ellison, the billionaire founder of the software company Oracle.
Hollywood veteran with problems
Paramount is one of the names that made Hollywood great. The studio produced classics such as "The Godfather" - and most recently blockbusters from the "Mission: Impossible" film series, among others. Skydance also brought Paramount money as co-producer of the latest box office hit "Top Gun: Maverick".
However, Paramount has been struggling with problems for several years. The American TV channel CBS, long a reliable money-maker, has been affected by the general decline in spending on TV advertising and the loss of cable customers. And the streaming service Paramount+ caused high start-up losses, but is far behind the industry leader Netflix in terms of user numbers. As a result, Paramount is sitting on a mountain of debt of 14 billion dollars.
