English Entertainment
Warner CEO Parson looking at net acquisitions; optimistic on better entertainment performance next year
MUMBAI: At a recently held investor conference US media conglomerate Time Warner chairman and CEO Richard Parsons says that the firm is looking at acquiring net properties.
Media reports state that Parsons is looking to stregthen its ad position. Warner is said to be looking at firms that offer technology that allow for ad insertion. The etchnology that Warbner is looking for lets companies place ads that are relevant to a particular viewer’s tastes.
Parsons acknowleged that 2006 has not been a good year as far as films are concerned. However he is optimistic that things will be different next year with films like Harry Potter And The Order Of the Phoenix, Oceans 13 set for release. He hinted that there may a small reduction in the number of films made.
As far as television is concerned he notes that the challenge is to ride the wave of technology, as opposed to getting too far in front or lagging behind. “Television viewing is still going up. So this business is not going away tomorrow. We want to maintain our strength in that business. We’re realigning so that we have a digital production studio, so to speak, so that things produced for television can find their way to other purely digital platforms.”
Parsons also noted that it is unfortunate that a war should be taking place in the HD DVD arena. This he says is leading to confusion. The war is between Sony which is championing the cause of Blu Ray and Toshiba which is fighting for HD DVD.
Parsons was quoted in reports saying that the releases for movies for platforms could be affected if current efforts to allow customers to download movies and then burn them on DVDs gain traction.
At the same time he maintains that the download-to-burn idea, which needs to be worked out carefully with existing distributors of movies such as retailers in order to succeed.
English Entertainment
Ellison takes his Paramount-Warner Bros case straight to theater owners
The Skydance chief goes to CinemaCon with promises and a skeptical crowd waiting
CALIFORNIA: David Ellison strode into a room packed with thousands of cinema owners and executives at CinemaCon in Las Vegas on Thursday and did something rather bold: he looked them in the eye and asked them to trust him.
The chief executive of Paramount Skydance vowed that his company would release a minimum of 30 films a year if regulators greenlight its proposed $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery, a deal that has made theater owners deeply, and loudly, nervous.
“I wanted to look every single one of you in the eye and give you my word,” Ellison told the crowd. “Once we combine with Warner Bros, we are going to make a minimum of 30 films annually across both studios.”
It was a confident pitch. Whether it landed is another matter. Cinema operators have already called on regulators to block the deal, and scepticism in the room was hardly concealed.
Ellison pushed back by pointing to recent form. Paramount, born from the merger of Paramount Global and Skydance Media last August, plans to release 15 films this year, nearly double the eight it put out in 2025. Progress, he argued, was already underway.
He also threw theater owners a bone they have long been chasing: all films, he pledged, would run exclusively in cinemas for a minimum of 45 days, drawing applause from a crowd that has spent years fighting for exactly that commitment across the industry.
“People can speculate all they want,” Ellison said, “but I am standing here today telling you personally that you can count on our complete commitment. And we’ll show you we mean it.”
Fine words. The regulators, however, will have the last one.
