Caroline Hyde

But Netflix has always been a company where they kind of never say never.

They say they're not going to do something, and then they end up doing it.

And it's been obvious over the course of the last two months, really since Greg's appearance at Screen Time, my confidence this would happen has increased bit by bit, including as people from Netflix told me that they were getting more and more serious about it.

I'll take them in three, although I will say that the Warner offer or the Paramount offer was not technically higher.

But I'll get into it.

So the process is, assuming that this all continues as planned, Warner Brothers Discovery will spin off its cable networks, the CNN, TNT, TBSs of the world, sometime third quarter next year.

They will then proceed with closing the sale of the rest of the business, which is the Warner Brothers Studio and HBO, HBO Max streaming to Netflix.

They expect that transaction will close in the next 12 to 18 months.

So let's say sometime in 27.

And then there will obviously be regulatory approval and all that, which could also drag on for some time.

Depends on when that enters the equation.

In terms of the value and all that, yes, Paramount offered $30 a share.

Netflix was just shy of $28.

But you have to remember that because Netflix is only buying two thirds of the company, there is a value that is being applied to the business that will be spun off that you add on top of the Netflix bid.

So a lot of whether the Netflix bid was more or less than paramount depends on the value you assign to those cable networks.

You know, people who are really skeptical and certainly folks I spoke with in the Paramount orbit are like those cable networks are worth nothing, maybe a dollar a share, maybe two.

You know, Warner Brothers may argue it's worth four or five dollars a share, in which case the Netflix offer is actually higher.

This is going to be a saga that plays out longer than Game of Thrones did.

Because, you know, not only do you have shareholder issues, your questions potentially, but you've already got the creative community in Hollywood rising up.

The Directors Guild wants to sit down with Netflix.