Netflix will acquire Warner Bros. Discovery for $72 billion (about 106 trillion won).
According to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) on the 5th (local time), Netflix was selected as the preferred negotiating party for the acquisition of Warner Bros. The value of the equity being transacted is $72 billion, and on a corporate value basis it comes to $82.7 billion. The transaction is set to close in the third quarter of 2026.
Warner Bros., born from the 2022 merger of WarnerMedia and Discovery, owns film and TV studios, the streaming service "HBO Max," and cable channels including CNN, TNT, and Discovery. With this acquisition, Netflix will obtain flagship intellectual property such as "Game of Thrones," "DC Comics," and "Harry Potter."
WSJ said Warner Bros. plans to complete a corporate split of its cable television unit before the sale is finalized. Warner Bros. announced in June that it would split the streaming and studio business units and the cable television unit into separate corporations by next year.
If the merger and acquisition between Warner Bros. and Netflix is completed, observers say the combination of the world's largest streaming service (Netflix) and a flagship Hollywood studio with a long history (Warner Bros.) will trigger a tectonic shift in the entertainment industry.