Bidding for Warner Bros Begins This Week. Who do You Think Buys Them?

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Preliminary bids for Warner Bros Discovery are due November 20, when suitors must submit first-round, non-binding offers, Deadline hears.

David Ellison’s Paramount, which made three overtures before the formal sale process started, will be ready. Comcast and Netflix, both of which hired investment banks to explore a deal, are also expected to jump in. With Hollywood M&A being keenly observed from Capitol Hill, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) on Friday send a letter to regulators warning a potential Netflix–WBD combination would raise antitrust concerns and could damage consumers and industry jobs.

Parties interested in WBD previously signed non-disclosure agreements and accessed a data room to dig through the company’s financials and prepare preliminary bids. A second round of binding offers will follow. If there is to be a sale, Warners is hoping to have settled on a buyer by Christmas.

WBD was originally pursuing a separation of its businesses that would put those assets together in a new stand-alone company called Warner Bros. run by current CEO David Zaslav. Global linear networks would be under Discovery Global, led by WBD’s current CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels. Paramount has offered to acquire the whole company. Comcast and Netflix are looking at Warner Bros. studios and streaming.

On Netflix, Rep. Issa’s missive to AG Pam Bondi, DOJ antitrust chief Gail Slater, and FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson warned against allowing the dominant streaming platform in the U.S. to absorb a major competitor in HBO Max. The two streamers combined would have a more than 30% share of the market, “a threshold viewed as presumptively problematic under antitrust law,” he noted.

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Larry Ellison will deliver a ‘full backstop’ for mogul son David’s plans to buy Warner Bros. Discovery: sources

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Comcast CEO Brian Roberts travels to Saudi Arabia as he explores bid for Warner Bros. Discovery

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