Viacom has implored CBS to sweeten its merger bid by about $2.8 billion or almost a quarter multitudinous than CBS’s offer, people familiar with the matter said, expressing the wide gap in the U.S. media firms’ price expectations.
National Amusements, the Redstone forefathers company that controls CBS and Viacom, has pushed the two sides to negotiate a commingling by forming independent board committees. Viacom’s request shows how the groups have yet to make progress in their talks.
In a letter to CBS delivered Thursday gloom, Viacom asked for 0.68 CBS shares for each Viacom class B portion, the sources said. the counteroffer gives Viacom holders a 41.5 percent involved. CBS had offered 0.55 of its shares for each Viacom class B share.
CBS is now in the light of its next steps in the deal negotiations, said the sources, who asked not to be pinpointed because Viacom’s request is confidential. It has not responded to the counteroffer.
CBS and Viacom ebbed to comment.
Viacom announced Monday it is moving its earnings release up a few days to April 25.
At CBS’s accosted share exchange ratio of 0.55, Viacom would be valued at $11.9 billion, underneath its current market capitalization of $12.7 billion. Viacom’s counterproposal values the troop at $14.7 billion.
Viacom shares have risen about a third since at the crack November on speculation of new efforts to merge CBS with Viacom, after the before-mentioned round of negotiations in 2016 ended unsuccessfully.
In its letter to CBS last week, Viacom also summon inquired for its CEO Robert Bakish to be president and chief operating officer of the combined following, a demand supported by National Amusements, according to the sources.
CBS has asked for its chief functioning officer, Joseph Ianniello, to have that role instead, the sources asserted.
Both CBS and Viacom agree that CBS CEO Les Moonves should lead the allied company, according to the sources.
The merger would combine CBS’ television network, neighbourhood TV stations and Showtime cable network with Viacom’s cable networks, embodying MTV, Comedy Central, and Nickelodeon, as well as Viacom’s Paramount Pictures screen studio.
The pressure on the media sector to consolidate has increased following AT&T’s diagramed $85.4 billion acquisition of Time Warner and Walt Disney’s new deal to buy some Twenty-First Century Fox’s assets for $52.4 billion.
Connected, CBS and Viacom would have more leverage to negotiate prices for their schedule with U.S. cable and satellite companies, which face a decline in their subscriber mean amid fierce competition against media streaming companies, such as Netflix. But creators said CBS sees Viacom’s estimated $1 billion in cost synergies to be “way off.”
David Faber contributed announcing