Edgar Bronfman Jr.\u2019s offer for a controlling stake in\u00a0Paramount Global\u00a0could keep Shari Redstone close to the company, if his bid is successful.<\/p>\n
Bronfman is open to having Redstone, currently non-executive chairman at Paramount, remain involved with the company if the Paramount special committee accepts his consortium\u2019s bid for National Amusements, the controlling shareholder, according to a person familiar with the matter.<\/p>\n
Bronfman has raised $6 billion to challenge Skydance Media for ownership of National Amusements, the holding company founded by Sumner Redstone, according to people familiar with the matter. Both Bronfman\u2019s bid and Skydance\u2019s bid would also include money to buy out a percentage of Paramount Global common shareholders.<\/p>\n
At $6 billion, Bronfman\u2019s bid would give cash to about 20% of Class B holders at $16 per share. Skydance would pay out about 50% of current Paramount common investors at $15 per share as part of its bid, according to the people familiar.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not clear if Redstone prefers one offer over the other. The Paramount Global special committee will determine if Bronfman\u2019s offer is a superior proposal for shareholders by Aug. 28. If the committee decides Bronfman\u2019s offer is better, Skydance will then have four business days to match. The deadline for the entire process to be concluded is Sept. 5.<\/p>\n
Bronfman still has a few more days to raise more money for a competing bid to counter Skydance, which agreed to an $8 billion deal to merge with Paramount Global\u00a0last month. The special committee earlier this week\u00a0extended the so-called \u201cgo-shop\u201d period\u00a0\u2014 during which it could entertain competing offers \u2014 by 15 days to review Bronfman\u2019s initial bid.<\/p>\n
One of the individuals who is part of Bronfman\u2019s bid is former AOL CEO Jon Miller, suggesting Redstone could potentially have more control over a future Paramount Global than she\u2019d get with Skydance. Miller, a close ally of Redstone, has been connecting Bronfman with potential capital and would likely take a role with the company if it came under Bronfman\u2019s stewardship \u2014 perhaps a board seat and an operational job \u2014 according to people familiar with the matter. Bronfman would be CEO of the company if his deal were to be accepted and go through, said the people.<\/p>\n
Miller, Redstone and Redstone\u2019s son-in-law, Jason Ostheimer, together run Advancit Capital, a small venture capital firm that invests in media and technology. The trio are the only three people that appear on\u00a0the firm\u2019s website.\u00a0Miller has also operated as a de facto strategic advisor to Redstone for many years, according to people familiar with the matter.<\/p>\n
Redstone has not spoken with Miller about the bid, according to people familiar with the matter.<\/p>\n
While the Redstone family and Bronfman family have run in similar circles, including donating heavily to Jewish foundations, Edgar Bronfman Jr. and Shari Redstone haven\u2019t met many times and don\u2019t have a close preexisting relationship, two of the people said.<\/p>\n
Skydance CEO David Ellison and Redstone have had several discussions about the potential for Redstone to stay in as a shareholder of a combined Skydance-Paramount Global, according to people familiar with the matter.<\/p>\n
Redstone is taking a wait-and-see approach to any future involvement she may want to have in Paramount Global moving forward regardless of its ownership, according to a person familiar with her thinking.<\/p>\n
Spokespeople for Redstone, Bronfman, the Paramount Global special committee and Skydance all declined to comment.<\/p>\n
Bronfman has spent the last few weeks aggregating individuals with interest in owning a piece of Paramount Global, including film producer Steven Paul and Patron cofounder John Paul DeJoria, who had previously considered a bid of their own, according to a person familiar with the process, as well as Fortress Investment Group, the credit arm of private equity firm BC Partners, and former Turner Broadcasting CEO John Martin.<\/p>\n
Bronfman\u2019s financing comes from many different sources, which may potentially trigger regulatory concerns if too much of the money is from foreign entities. Having so many different financers may also make Bronfman\u2019s offer riskier than Skydance\u2019s bid, which is backed by private equity firm RedBird Capital and multibillionaire Larry Ellison, the father of David Ellison.<\/p>\n
Bronfman is the chairman of\u00a0Fubo,\u00a0a sports streaming service, and the former head of Universal and Warner Music.<\/p>\n
Skydance\u2019s lawyers sent a letter to the Paramount Global special committee demanding the company stop negotiating with Bronfman, the Wall Street Journal\u00a0reported Thursday.\u00a0Skydance said Paramount Global breached the terms of the go-shop agreement by not alerting Skydance that it planned to extend the window, the report said.<\/p>\n
Skydance also argued the special committee didn\u2019t have the right to extend the go-shop because a bid had to \u201creasonably be expected to lead to a superior proposal.\u201d Skydance argued the Bronfman bid didn\u2019t meet the criteria.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Edgar Bronfman Jr.\u2019s offer for a controlling stake in\u00a0Paramount Global\u00a0could keep Shari Redstone close to the company, if his bid is successful. Bronfman is open to having Redstone, currently non-executive chairman at Paramount, remain involved with the company if the Paramount special committee accepts his consortium\u2019s bid for National Amusements, the controlling shareholder, according to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":8547,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8546"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8546\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}