Britain’s culture minister Lisa Nandy said Tuesday she may intervene in Paramount Skydance’s proposed takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery.
Nandy said she wrote letters to both companies stating she was "minded to intervene" on "public interest grounds," specifically citing the need for "a sufficient plurality of views..."
Nandy said she had not made "a final decision on intervention at this stage" and invited Paramount and Warner Bros. to respond to her concerns by Monday.
If Nandy decides to intervene, Ofcom would launch an assessment of the deal and the Competition and Markets Authority would examine how the merger might reshape the competitive landscape.
The companies’ assets cited in filings include CBS News, Nickelodeon and Channel 5 for Paramount; and CNN, HBO, Cartoon Network, Animal Planet and the Warner Bros. film and TV studios in Burbank, with TNT Sports carrying the Olympics, Champions League and Premier League soccer matches.
The U.S. Justice Department has approved the sale and U.S. antitrust regulators concluded the combination would not violate federal anticompetition laws, and Australia, New Zealand, China, Saudi Arabia, Ukraine, Serbia, France and Italy have already given approvals.
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund is planning to contribute $10 billion to the financing, and the royal families of Qatar and Abu Dhabi have agreed to contribute $7 billion each.
The Federal Communications Commission must evaluate foreign ownership stakes because Paramount holds CBS broadcast licenses.
A coalition of state attorneys general led by California's Rob Bonta is expected to challenge the deal, and a "block the merger" campaign led by Jane Fonda and Mark Ruffalo says it has the support of more than 5,000 entertainment workers; Paramount Chief Legal Officer Makan Delrahim called the campaign "fear-mongering" and a partisan distortion of antitrust law.
Mike Proulx, vice president and research director at Forrester, said, "For U.S. consumers, this merger has become a proxy fight about political influence and control of media. In the UK, it's being treated as a structural competition issue where regulators, not consumers, will decide."