The bidding war has ended, and Netflix has been declared the winner.
After flirting with Paramount Skydance and Comcast, Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) has decided to sell its streaming and movie studio business to Netflix. If approved, the deal would overturn the media landscape and create a stir that will impact Hollywood for years.
$72 billion acquisition
Netflix will pay an equity value of $72 billion for Warner Bros., or an estimated total enterprise value of $82.7 billion. As NBC News notes, the market value of all WBD is $60 billion.
The acquisition will occur after WBD completes the divestiture of its streaming and studio businesses, including its film and TV libraries and its other TV networks, including the HBO channel, and CNN and TBS, into separate companies (Warner Bros. and Discovery Global, respectively). The divestiture of WBD is expected to close in the third quarter of 2026.
Additionally, the acquisition of Netflix is subject to regulatory approval, WBD shareholder approval and other “customary closing conditions.”
Its announcement said Netflix expects the purchase to bring in more subscribers, increase engagement and “yield cost savings of at least $2-3 billion per year by year three.”
Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters said in a statement that Netflix will use its global reach and business model to bring WB content to a “wider audience.”
The announcement did not specify what this means for current WBD employees, including current WBD President and CEO David Zaslav. Gunnar Weidenfels, currently CFO of WBD, is expected to become CEO of Discovery Global following the WBD split.
Netflix owns HBO Max
Netflix must overcome regulatory hurdles to close the deal, which would transform it from a streaming king to an entertainment behemoth. If completed, the world’s largest streaming service by subscribers (301.63 million as of January) would eclipse its third-largest rival (WBD has 128 million streaming subscribers, the majority of whom are HBO Max users).
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