Paramount Skydance is on course to win the Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) takeover battle after rival Netflix stepped away. The world’s largest streaming service had been in the lead position to land a deal by which it would pay $27.75 per share for Warner’s studio and HBO Max streaming businesses, valuing the divisions at almost $83 billion including debt. But the latest Paramount offer might bring the curtains down on one of the fiercest takeover battles in recent times.
Netflix had been invited to raise its bid after Paramount submitted a final offer of $111 billion for the entire WBD business, at $31 per share earlier this week.
Warner’s board declared on the night of February 26 that while it continued to recommend the offer by Netflix, it now considered the proposal from Paramount as “superior” — its first hint of support for the bidder declared as hostile when the saga began back in December 2025. Netflix responded by pulling out of the process just hours later, declaring that a deal was “no longer financially attractive”.
Netflix co-CEOs Ted Sarandos and Greg Peters said: “We believe, we would have been strong stewards of Warner Bros.’ iconic brands. But this transaction was always a ‘nice to have’ at the right price, not a ‘must have’ at any price”. The decision to withdraw does not mean that Paramount has clinched the WBD deal just yet. For, the board is yet to give its blessing to the deal though WBD has changed its tone and voiced support for the bid for the first time.
CEO David Zaslav declared that Paramount’s offer “will create tremendous value”, adding that WBD was “excited about the potential of a combined Paramount Skydance and Warner Bros. Discovery”.
Warner shareholders and regulators will also have to agree to the takeover.
If Paramount Skydance is successful in its takeover attempt, it would own the news channel CNN as well as CBS News, sparking concern about concentrating news services within a small number of companies linked to Donald Trump’s allies. Paramount’s chairman and CEO David Ellison is the son of billionaire Larry Ellison, an ally of the US president who has put up tens of billions of dollars to satisfy funding guarantees for the WBD bid.
A Paramount-Warner combination would encompass two of Hollywood’s five legacy studios.
There were big movements for share prices in after-hours trading as the developments played out. Netflix saw its stock climb by 8.5% in a relief rally while those for Paramount were also up sharply — by 6.2%. WBD shares were trading almost 2% lower at $28.80 — well below the Paramount offer price of $31.
