By Jody Godoy <\/p>\n
July 13 (Reuters) – California and 11 states are suing to block Paramount’s $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, alleging the deal would lessen \u200ccompetition in film distribution and cable television, harming theaters and pay TV \u200cdistributors. <\/p>\n
The lawsuit is a serious threat to Paramount CEO David Ellison’s bid to transform his company into a \u200bmajor competitor to Netflix and Disney. <\/p>\n
“With this lawsuit, California and our sister states are fighting for free and fair markets, not rigged markets. America has no kings in government or our economy,” Bonta said in a statement. <\/p>\n
If allowed to move forward with the deal, Paramount \u200cwould control 27% of the \u2060distribution market for films that appear on screens across America, 30% of blockbuster film distribution and 27% of the market for basic cable \u2060channels, the states said. <\/p>\n
It will likely take months for a ruling on the states’ claims, causing a delay that could rack up hundreds of millions of dollars in costs for Paramount. <\/p>\n
The \u200bdeal has \u200bled to an outcry from actors, writers \u200band others fearing it will hurt \u200cjobs. Theater owners also opposed the deal, worrying the combination of the Warner Bros movie studio with Paramount Pictures would result in fewer films. <\/p>\n
Paramount has said the deal will allow it to produce more, not less, after it cuts $6 billion in redundant infrastructure, marketing and corporate jobs. Ellison has vowed that the combined film studios would release 30 \u200cmovies a year. <\/p>\n
The U.S. Department of Justice has \u200bcleared the deal, saying it poses no competition problems. <\/p>\n
Paramount \u200bCEO David Ellison’s father, billionaire Oracle \u200bco-founder Larry Ellison, has cultivated ties with President Donald Trump, and \u200cthe company has hired former Trump officials. <\/p>\n
Paramount \u200bhas committed to pay \u200baround $650 million in fees to Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders each quarter if the deal does not close before October. The company has said delays could force \u200bit to renegotiate the deal’s \u200cfinancing, cause uncertainty for its stock price, or even scuttle the transaction \u200baltogether. <\/p>\n
(Reporting by Jody Godoy in New York and Dawn Chmielewski in Los Angeles; \u200bEditing by Nia Williams and Franklin Paul) <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Jody Godoy July 13 (Reuters) – California and 11 states are suing to block Paramount’s $110 billion…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":396679,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8,21405,159434,6336,2803,14955],"class_list":["post-396678","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-david-ellison","tag-film-distribution","tag-paramount","tag-president-donald-trump","tag-warner-bros"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396678","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=396678"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396678\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/396679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=396678"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=396678"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=396678"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}