RedBird puts $4 billion behind Paramount's Warner Bros. takeover
RedBird Capital Partners has put $4 billion into Paramount's deal to buy Warner Bros. Discovery.
The money is new equity financing, meaning cash invested in exchange for ownership to help pay for the takeover, according to Bloomberg. A source familiar with the deal confirmed the $4 billion figure to Variety. Bloomberg first reported the investment on 6 October 2026.
RedBird is one of only two backers behind the takeover, alongside the Ellison family, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
It is not RedBird's first cheque in this story. The firm previously invested $2 billion in David Ellison's Skydance Media to support its takeover of Paramount Global, which closed in August 2025. That earlier backing was confirmed by the same source to Variety. The new $4 billion takes RedBird's total investment in the Ellisons' media holdings to $6 billion.
Control sits tightly at the top. The Ellison family, through Larry Ellison's equity investment, holds the largest equity stake in Skydance. The Ellisons and RedBird together are the sole holders of Paramount's Class A common stock, meaning the voting shares that decide company control, giving them 100% of the votes.
At the centre is Gerry Cardinale. He is founder and managing partner of RedBird Capital Partners and serves as a director on Skydance's board. RedBird says it holds investments in more than 50 companies representing over $82 billion in enterprise value, a measure of a company's total value including debt. The firm also acquired control of the media startup Puck in a deal valuing that business at $250 million.
The wider deal has an enterprise value of about $110 billion, according to RedBird company material. The boards of Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery have unanimously approved the transaction. Paramount has said it expects the acquisition to close in Q3 2026, subject to customary closing conditions.
The road here was bumpy. Paramount Skydance submitted a $108.4 billion hostile bid, meaning an offer made directly despite opposition, for Warner Bros. Discovery in December 2025, according to Reuters. Warner Bros. Discovery's board rejected that bid and described it as "illusory". The board also raised concerns about Paramount's financing, and Paramount's bid complicated a rival bid from Netflix.
In July 2026, a federal judge ordered Paramount Skydance to pause its acquisition push through 3 August.
For viewers, this means money talks before schedules do. If the deal closes, the combined libraries would include more than 15,000 titles. Behind each of those slots are crews, writers' rooms and production teams waiting to learn who commissions the next series and who finishes the current one.
