Channel 5 owner Paramount slashes thousands of jobs

David Ellison’s Skydance Media acquired Paramount in August - Kyle Grillot/Bloomberg

Thousands of jobs will be axed at Channel 5’s American owner, Paramount, just weeks after the company was acquired by the billionaire Ellison family.

More than 2,000 redundancies are expected at the media giant, which owns Hollywood film studios and TV channels including CBS, after its new owners unveiled plans to cut 10pc of its global workforce.

The cuts will start with about 1,000 jobs across the US, with redundancies for international employees to follow. It is not clear how many jobs in the UK will be affected.

In August, Paramount was acquired by Skydance Media, the Hollywood studio founded by David Ellison, son of the billionaire Oracle founder Larry Ellison.

In a memo to staff on Wednesday, David Ellison said the job cuts were “necessary to position Paramount for long-term success”.

He added: “In some areas, we are addressing redundancies that have emerged across the organisation. In others, we are phasing out roles that are no longer aligned with our evolving priorities and the new structure designed to strengthen our focus on growth.”

‘Leaner, faster, smarter’

Following the deal, Mr Ellison had outlined plans to cut $2bn (£1.5bn) of costs to create a “leaner, faster, smarter and more agile company”, although at the time he did not disclose how many jobs could go.

Paramount has been hit with successive layoffs in recent years, including about 2,000 US employees last summer, as traditional media giants grapple with a downturn in their legacy cable businesses and the rise of streaming.

Further cuts had been expected in the wake of the Paramount takeover.

Mr Ellison has been quick to shake up Paramount since taking control of the historic Hollywood studio, which has produced blockbusters such as Titanic and Forrest Gump, this summer.

Just days after the takeover closed, Paramount struck a $7.7bn deal to secure exclusive rights to the Ultimate Fighting Championship for seven years.

It has also bought The Free Press, a news start-up founded by the journalist Bari Weiss, for a reported $150m, with Ms Weiss taking up the role of editor-in-chief at CBS News.

Skydance has now set its sights on Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) in what could be an even more audacious takeover that would further reshape the US media and likely lead to further job cuts.

However, the WBD boss David Zaslav said last month that the company, which owns the Harry Potter film studios and networks including HBO and CNN, was open to takeover offers, firing the starting gun on a bidding war.

Netflix and Sky owner Comcast are reported to be among the rival suitors.

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Skydance’s second-largest investor is RedBird Capital Partners, the US private equity company seeking to take control of The Telegraph.

Aside from job cuts, the Ellison family’s empire-building in the US media has attracted controversy because of concerns about their links to Donald Trump and potential political interference.

Just weeks before the takeover was approved, Paramount agreed to settle a $16m defamation lawsuit with Mr Trump.

Stephen Colbert, host of CBS’s The Late Show, branded the settlement a “big fat bribe”, leading to his show being cancelled by the network.

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