Paramount and Skydance have agreed to the terms of a merger deal, reported David Faber of CNBC on Monday. A deal between the two entertainment giants may be announced in the coming days, said Faber.
The terms were agreed upon by a Paramount special committee and Skydance, backed by two private equity firms KKR and RedBird Capital.
Faber stated that the merger is waiting for Shari Redstone, Paramount’s controlling shareholder. Redstone owns National Amusements, which owns 77% of Paramount’s Class A shares, CNBC reported.
It took weeks of discussions between the parties to come up with the terms. There were also competing offers from Sony Pictures and Apollo Global Management.
“We received the financial terms of the proposed Paramount/Skydance transaction over the weekend and we are reviewing them,” said a spokesperson from National Amusements.
Redstone is set to receive $2 billion for National Amusements out of tht edeal, Faber said on Monday. Skydance would be buying out almost half of Paramount’s class B shares at $15 per share, totaling $4.5 billion, which would leave shareholders with equity in the new entity.
Aside from the abovementioned figures, a $1.5 billion cash contribution would be made by Skydance and RedBird to Paramount in order to help reduce debt from the balance sheet of the latter.
Once the deal is closed, two-thirds of Paramount would be co-owned by Skydance and RedBird, and the rest of the company will be owned by the Class B shareholders, Variety reported.
One of the agreed terms during the negotiations for the merger was that the deal would no longer require a vote from Paramount’s shareholders.
