As speculation swirls about whether Paramount Skydance will make an offer for rival media giant Warner Bros. Discovery, the former’s CEO says he’s not able to talk about it.
“We’re a publicly traded company, so we’re not in a position to be able to comment on rumors or speculation of any kind,” Paramount Skydance head David Ellison said Thursday at Bloomberg’s Screentime event.
Ellison did, however, offer some thoughts on what he says is the company’s “mindset” regarding long-term strategy.
“I think, ironically, it was [WBD CEO] David Zaslav who said last year that consolidation in the media business is important. The way we approach everything is, first and foremost, what’s good for the talent community, what’s good for our shareholders and value creation, and what’s good for, basically, storytelling at large,” Ellison said. “From our standpoint, whether we approach any acquisition — and I actually do think there are a lot of options out there in terms of what might be actionable in the near future — we would approach it through the lens of wanting to make more, not less. … You need more content to yield more engagement.”
As for what those options for potential M&A might be? Another no comment.
More to come.