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Hi, this is Cara Swisser from Scott Galloway HQ. Netflix has emerged as the winner in the war of the media titans.
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The company just announced plans to acquire Warner Brothers Discovery Studio and streaming businesses only in a deal
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valued at 82.7 billion dollars that includes debt. The move follows a bidding war among
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Netflix, Comcast, and Paramount, and things have gotten contentious. Uh Paramount wrote a letter to Warner
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Brothers this week calling the process tainted. Obviously, it was a clear signal that David Ellison, the son of
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Larry Ellison, whose money uh he has been spending, uh was not going to get the deal. Uh but Netflix appears
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confident. It's offering a $5.5 billion breakup fee just like Paramount did if regulators don't approve the deal. So,
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uh for those paying mind, as we discussed on Pivot recently, it there's been a definite [ __ ] that guy feel
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related to the threat of Trump blocking anyone but his cronies. like the Ellison's from owning all the juicy
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bits. The the deal was existential to both Comcast and Netflix. One of them I felt was going to get it and they were
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not going to back down in the face of Paramount's really clottish Nepo Baby and Big Daddy shaking a Trump stick at
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them. And it's a real opportunity cuz Netflix, which usually would be the villain in this story, um has shifted
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the villain over to Paramount. Paramount, many people feel, is going to go hostile uh and take the matter to
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shareholders presenting their deal. um that letter was sort of the first uh parry in that fight. I think it's a
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mistake for them because I don't think they have goodwill of Hollywood and oddly enough Netflix and Ted Sarando's
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its very crafty CEO does. Um I think Netflix is a very gutsy company and so they obviously have calculated their
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fight is worth having away from all this all this drama is that this is a major turning event for Hollywood with
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Netflix. It'll change the way movies are released. Ted Sarandos is not a fan of long windows uh into theaters. So he
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will face opposition from theater owners. He will face opposition from writers. All these companies will as the
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consolidation of Hollywood goes on. But it's really a consolidating time. Paramount uh could go hostile. It might.
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It certainly has enough money. It just whether Larry Ellison wants to do it. I think David Ellison has really
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misstepped here pretty badly. So it's up to his dad to decide uh because he has all the money. Obviously, there's going
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to be a legal battle with the Justice Department. So, they've got to deal with that. You're seeing a real push back
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from companies who decided to take on the Trump uh administration. Most companies have been really acquiescent.
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And I think they feel a shift has happened that Trump's power is waning. This is going to get uh worse before it
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gets better. And you will see a real reflection from Hollywood of what has happened, which is tech has, no matter
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how you slice it, taken over. the other companies to watch. You might see a Disney Comcast or Apple Disney and
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everything else. So, uh, buckle up your seat belts, uh, as they say in the movies. It's going to be a bumpy ride.