Paramount to combine HBO Max and Paramount+ into one streaming service after WBD merger

Paramount+ and HBO Max might be mixed into one streaming service if regulators approve Paramount Skydance’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount CEO David Ellison mentioned on a convention name Monday.

A mixed service would have about 200 million subscribers given current totals, Ellison mentioned throughout his firm’s investor name in regards to the WBD transaction. Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery mentioned final week that they had struck an settlement to promote WBD for $31 per share after Netflix backed out of the extended bidding battle.

Paramount executives did not supply any particulars Monday on how the corporate might worth a mixed service or what it might be known as. Nonetheless, Ellison mentioned he would not disrupt the HBO model.

“HBO ought to keep HBO,” he mentioned, citing its lengthy historical past of high quality programming.

HBO is probably going to be a sub-brand throughout the bigger service, in accordance to an individual accustomed to Paramount’s plans. HBO is presently run by Casey Bloys, whose contract runs out in 2027, one other particular person mentioned. Bloys declined to remark.

Paramount additionally touted the energy of its sports activities providing on a mixed service, bringing collectively TNT Sports activities with CBS Sports activities.

Paramount executives mentioned they have not heard something from regulators to sign that the breadth of their sports activities choices — which would come with March Insanity, NFL, MLB, NHL, Nascar, French Open, The Masters, faculty soccer and extra — would set off any antitrust considerations.

HBO has been housed in quite a lot of streaming companies with completely different names in recent times.

Time Warner initially launched HBO as a streaming choice in 2010, known as HBO Go. 5 years later, HBO additionally launched HBO Now, giving customers a method to entry HBO outdoors of the cable bundle for the primary time.

After AT&T acquired Time Warner in 2018, renaming it WarnerMedia, executives launched HBO Max in 2020 in an try to add heft and extra subscribers.

Three years later, after AT&T divested WarnerMedia and merged it with Discovery, Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav renamed the service Max to showcase the addition of Discovery’s programming to the service.

That call was reversed final yr, when Zaslav and Bloys determined to revert again to the HBO Max identify to spotlight the energy of HBO’s programming.