Skydance's Ellison Out to Reshape Media Landscape

David Ellison, the 42-year-old CEO of Paramount, has signed a $7.7 billion deal to bring Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) matches to Paramount+ and CBS, poached “Stranger Things” creators Matt and Ross Duffer from Netflix, and acquired the Free Press, appointing its chief Bari Weiss as editor-in-chief of CBS News. 

In the past six weeks, Ellison, backed by his father, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, has made three unsuccessful bids for Warner Bros. Discovery, prompting its board to consider a sale.

A successful acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery would create an entertainment giant, merging Warner and Paramount studios, Paramount+ and HBO Max, and cable networks like CNN and Comedy Central. However, combining operations, particularly CNN and CBS News, could lead to significant layoffs, with Paramount already planning thousands of job cuts next week. Industry concerns grow over further consolidation and job losses.

Weiss, in her three weeks at CBS News, has stirred controversy by requesting employee job description memos, aligning with Ellison’s vision to target a center-left to center-right audience. No concrete plans for merging CNN and CBS News have been confirmed, according to sources close to Ellison. 

His rapid moves signal an ambitious reshaping of the media industry, though his meteoric rise as a new public company CEO fuels both optimism and apprehension.