Hollywood
Warner Bros board reopens talks after Paramount raises bid to $31 a share
Netflix has four days to revise $27.75-a-share proposal
NEW YORK: The board of Warner Bros Discovery has reopened talks with Paramount Skydance after the rival bidder raised its cash offer to $31 a share, intensifying a takeover contest for one of Hollywood’s most prized studios, Reuters reported.
Paramount’s revised proposal has pulled Warner Bros’ directors back to the negotiating table, even as Netflix risks losing its status as the preferred suitor. The board said it had not yet concluded whether Paramount’s offer was superior to the Netflix deal, but confirmed it would engage further with both sides. Should a higher bid emerge, Netflix has four business days to respond.
In a bid to strengthen its hand, Paramount increased the termination fee payable if regulators block the deal to $7 billion, up from $5.8 billion. It also agreed to pay Warner shareholders 25 cents a share per quarter for every quarter beyond 30 September that the transaction fails to close. Paramount further offered to inject additional equity should lenders raise concerns about financing at completion.
Paramount’s $31-a-share bid is an all-cash offer for the entire company. Netflix, by contrast, has proposed $27.75 a share in cash, valuing the deal at $82.7 billion including net debt, for Warner’s film and television studios, content library and the HBO Max streaming platform.
The comparison is muddied by structure. Warner plans to spin off its television networks into a separately listed company, Discovery Global. The ultimate value of Netflix’s offer therefore depends on the spun-off unit’s debt load and market valuation. The board estimates Discovery Global could trade between $1.33 and $6.86 a share, potentially lifting overall shareholder returns above Paramount’s earlier $30-a-share proposal.
Either outcome would reshape Hollywood’s balance of power, handing the winner a deep content vault and enduring franchises including Game of Thrones and DC Comics. Netflix has ample cash to raise its offer, while Paramount argues it faces fewer regulatory hurdles in the United States. It has also signalled readiness to mount a board challenge at Warner’s annual meeting if its proposal is rejected.
That pressure is building. One potential director nominee floated by Paramount is Pentwater Capital Management chief executive Matthew Halbower, one of Warner’s largest shareholders. Separately, activist investor Ancora Holdingshas accused the board of insufficient engagement with Paramount.
Warner is due to report quarterly results this week, which may shed more light on the value of its cable television assets. Paramount reports earnings on Wednesday. A shareholder vote on the Netflix deal is scheduled for 20 March.
Hollywood
Utopai Studios partners Huace to deploy PAI for long form content
Deal includes revenue sharing as Huace adopts AI engine across global ops
MUMBAI: Lights, camera… algorithm, the script just got a silicon co-writer. In a move that signals how storytelling itself is being re-engineered, U.S.-based Utopai Studios has partnered China’s Huace Film & TV Co. Ltd. to bring artificial general intelligence into the heart of long-form content creation.
At the centre of the deal is PAI, Utopai’s cinematic storytelling system, which Huace will deploy as a core engine across its production pipeline from development and creative iteration to global localisation. The partnership includes a large-scale annual usage commitment from Huace, alongside a usage-based revenue-sharing model, underscoring both ambition and commercial confidence on both sides.
For Huace, one of China’s largest film and television companies, the bet is not on automation alone but on scale with control. With distribution spanning over 200 countries and a presence across more than 20 international platforms, including Netflix and YouTube, the company brings a vast content ecosystem where even marginal efficiency gains can translate into significant output shifts. Its extensive TV IP library further positions it as fertile ground for AI-assisted storytelling workflows.
The choice of PAI follows what Huace described as a rigorous evaluation of existing AI tools, many of which remain limited to fragmented use cases such as video generation or editing. What tipped the scales, according to the company, was PAI’s ability to handle long-form narrative complexity maintaining continuity, structure, and creative coherence across entire story arcs rather than isolated clips.
Utopai, for its part, is using the partnership to anchor its international expansion strategy, pitching PAI as an enterprise-ready system built for customisation, privacy, and regulatory adaptability across markets. That positioning becomes particularly relevant as global media companies increasingly scrutinise how AI integrates into proprietary workflows.
The timing is notable. Earlier this month, Utopai upgraded PAI to support three-minute 4K video generation and advanced multi-shot sequencing features designed to tackle one of AI storytelling’s biggest hurdles: consistency across scenes.
What emerges is not just another tech collaboration, but a glimpse into how the grammar of filmmaking could evolve. Because if stories were once crafted frame by frame, the next chapter might just be coded scene by scene.
