Elon Musk has reportedly invested around $1 billion in Skydance, the new media empire led by David Ellison.
The deal comes with new equity injections from existing investors, including board member and widow of Steve Jobs, Laurene Powell Jobs. Semafor was the first to announce the news.
The investment follows Paramount’s recent $111 billion merger with Warner Bros. Discovery, a huge acquisition that brought the media companies together under the Skydance name. At the head of the new media empire is David Ellison, the son of billionaire co-founder of Oracle and Donald Trump ally, Larry Ellison.
The Guardian has contacted Musk and Skydance for comment.
The cash infusion solidifies an alliance between two of Trump’s wealthiest backers. In September, Semafor reported that Paramount executives viewed Musk as a stock investor, citing his close ties to Larry Ellison, who invested $1 billion in Musk’s 2022 acquisition of of the current mid-term elections in the United States.
After the merger, Skydance co-CEOs David Ellison and Ynon Kreiz, who previously led Mattel, informed employees that the integration would result in layoffs, saying, “Integrating two companies will bring changes, including difficult decisions that will impact our workforce.”
The company’s management — which now oversees Paramount and Warner Bros. film studios, HBO Max, CBS News and CNN — has set a cost savings goal of more than $6 billion over the next three years, a goal that Los Angeles County officials say could result in the loss of 4,500 film and television jobs in Los Angeles alone.
Before the merger, a coalition of 12 states, including California and New York, sued Paramount, arguing that the deal would “extinguish” competition and lead to “higher prices, lower quality and less content for film and television.”
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In September, a settlement agreement required Skydance to broadcast at least 30 films and more than 180 television shows per year, while ensuring that CBS and CNN retained their editorial independence.
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