{"id":705878,"date":"2026-07-22T21:01:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T21:01:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/705878\/"},"modified":"2026-07-22T21:01:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T21:01:09","slug":"paramount-takeover-of-warner-bros-wins-eu-approval","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/705878\/","title":{"rendered":"Paramount Takeover Of Warner Bros. Wins EU Approval"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tParamount<\/a>\u2018s $111 billion deal to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery<\/a> (WBD) has taken a major step forward after securing approval from the European Union\u2019s antitrust authority. As was previously reported<\/a>, Paramount has agreed to remedies, mainly exiting its international distribution deal with Universal Pictures. <\/p>\n

\n\tThe European Commission\u2019s greenlight of the media mega-merger Wednesday was welcome news for David Ellison<\/a> as he contends with legal challenges in the U.S.<\/a> and regulatory uncertainty in the UK<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\n\tIn a statement, Paramount called the approval \u201ca major milestone in completing the transaction in line with the publicly stated timeline\u201d and said the EU findings \u201cdirectly refute key assumptions that underpin the State AGs\u2019 complaint seeking to block the transaction.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tParamount has planned to close in the third quarter, specifically by the end of September. The Ellisons had agreed to pay a substantial so-called ticking fee to Warner shareholders for each day after Sept. 30 that the deal is not closed.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe\u00a0lawsuit filed by California Attorney General Rob Bonta<\/a>\u00a0and 11 other states claims the proposed merger violates\u00a0antitrust<\/a>\u00a0law in three markets \u2014 for wide release films, blockbuster films, and cable network licensing. Earlier this week, the judge in the case granted a temporary restraining order<\/a> that paused the merger for 14 days. The AGs are now preparing a petition for a preliminary injunction to block the deal from closing pending the outcome of a trial. <\/p>\n

\n\tA hearing on the injunction is set for August 3 the Northern District of California. <\/p>\n

\n\tSeparately, the Writers Guild Of America is also seeking a preliminary injunction<\/a> to block the deal. <\/p>\n

\n\tIn today\u2019s decision, the European Commission did not find the merger posed undue pressure on film production, or \u201caudiovisual\u201d channels. There are a sufficient number of film studios in the European Economic Area to compete with a merged Paramount-WBD, it said. ticking off U.S. majors Disney, Universal and Sony, other players like Amazon MGM, A24 and Lionsgate, and European studios.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe States\u2019 suit in the U.S. focuses on the big five Hollywood majors, which would drop to four in a Paramount-WBD combination. It does not consider smaller studios in determining the relevant market. <\/p>\n

\n\tAs for \u201cthe\u00a0AV value chain,\u201d the Commission said its investigation showed \u201cenough alternative competitors\u00a0remain to exert sufficient competitive pressure on the merged entity in the EEA.\u201d That includes pay TV channels for kids, where it found that \u201cstreaming platforms offering children\u2019s content will continue to act as a competitive constraint on the merged entity\u2019s TV channels.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSaid Paramount: \u201cThe European Commission\u00a0rightly considered streaming platforms as competing directly with linear TV. These conclusions further undermine the market definition relied upon by the state AGs in their complaint.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tDistribution Remedy<\/p>\n

\n\tAs expected, the Commission did find competitive risk in film distribution, writing that as a result of the transaction, \u201cthere will be\u00a0high concentration\u00a0and\u00a0increased transparency\u00a0in the EEA countries where Paramount has a structural partnership with Universal, due to the addition of Warner\u2019s film portfolio. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe partnership focuses on the distribution of Paramount\u2019s and Universal\u2019s films to cinema operators through their joint venture, United International Pictures (\u2018UIP\u2019). The transaction would have meant Warner\u2019s films were also distributed via UIP and, without the commitments, it would have led to worse rental and distribution terms for cinema operators, ultimately disadvantaging consumers.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tParamount has 13 months from the deal close to unwind its stake in UIP in the EEA.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Commission stipulated that, \u201cfor a period of\u00a0ten years,\u00a0Paramount will not, directly or indirectly: enter into any agreement or understanding with Universal to jointly co-distribute films in the EEA; shift the distribution of Warner\u2019s films from Warner\u2019s existing distributor to the theatrical distributor used by Paramount, where that distributor also distributes Universal\u2019s or Disney\u2019s films in all UIP countries in the EEA (Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia and Sweden); and in the UIP countries in the EEA where Paramount and Universal do not share the same distributor, shift the distribution of Paramount\u2019s films from Paramount\u2019s existing distributor to the theatrical distributor used by Warner, where that distributor also distributes Universal\u2019s or Disney\u2019s films.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThese commitments\u00a0\u201cfully address the competition concerns\u00a0identified by the Commission by ensuring that the films of the merged entity will not be distributed jointly with those of Universal or Disney,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n

\n\tAn independent trustee under the Commission\u2019s supervision would monitor implementation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Paramount\u2018s $111 billion deal to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) has taken a major step forward after securing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":705879,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[16384,96,59,3770,56,54,55,18200],"class_list":["post-705878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-david-ellison","tag-entertainment","tag-gb","tag-paramount","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-warner-bros-discovery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/705878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=705878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/705878\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/705879"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=705878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=705878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=705878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}