Shari Wants More

Shari Redstone has long sought to combine CBS and Viacom. If she has her way, that could be just the start, according to Claire Atkinson at NBC News.

Redstone, who is president of National Amusements, the controlling shareholder of CBS and Viacom, has held conversations about quickly pursuing acquisitions that would help the company compete with other sizable media operations, according to three parties familiar with the talks who were not authorized to speak publicly.

Credit: Marco Grob for Variety

Redstone has floated two different companies for possible deals: movie and television studio Sony Pictures Entertainment and nonfiction TV company Discovery Communications.

“The CBS-Viacom merger is, to her, a starting line, not a finish line,” one of the people familiar with the situation said.

A combined CBS and Viacom would still be small compared to media titans such as Disney and WarnerMedia, and Redstone is eager for the new entity to compete with much larger players. The market value of CBS is about $19.7 billion and Viacom’s is close to $12.7 billion, while Netflix has a market value of around $142.7 billion.

One source said Redstone would be sure to have the backing of the board of the combined company. In January, CNBC reported on the possibility of Sony and Discovery as potential targets. Neither deal is imminent however.