By Joe Flint and Lauren Thomas
Paramount has had early discussions with Middle Eastern sovereign-wealth funds about investing in its potential tie-up with Warner Bros. Discovery if and when such a deal closes, according to people familiar with the matter.
The talks with Saudi Arabia's sovereign-wealth fund and other big Gulf investors are ongoing, and the funds aren't expected to be named in the nonbinding proposal that Paramount will submit this week as suitors bid on Warner Discovery, the people said.
Paramount's bid is expected to be in the same range of its latest unsolicited proposal, which valued Warner Discovery at $23.50 a share, some of the people said.
Any foreign investors would likely only play a role, if at all, should Paramount secure a deal for Warner Discovery and decide to bring in outside investors after the transaction closes, the people said.
The Financial Times earlier reported that Paramount CEO David Ellison had recently met with Saudi's Public Investment Fund and other officials from the region.
Paramount's majority-cash bid is fully backed by the Ellison family, which includes Chief Executive David Ellison's billionaire father, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, and private-equity firm RedBird Capital Partners.
The deadline for initial bids for Warner Discovery is Thursday. Besides Paramount, cable and entertainment company Comcast and streamer Netflix are among potential bidders, The Wall Street Journal has reported. Warner Discovery would like to conclude the auction by the end of the year.
Paramount is expected to bid for all of Warner Discovery, including its movie and television studios, the HBO Max streaming service and a portfolio of cable networks that includes CNN, TNT and Food Network. It has already made multiple bids that Warner Discovery has rebuffed.
Comcast and Netflix are interested in Warner Discovery's movie and television studios, film and TV library and HBO Max.
The younger Ellison on Tuesday attended a dinner hosted by the White House to coincide with the visit to Washington by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (also known as MBS). Also at the gathering were Apple CEO Tim Cook and Tesla CEO Elon Musk, among other tech-industry leaders.
Dealings with Saudi Arabia have been a touchy subject in Hollywood since the 2018 murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The Central Intelligence Agency at the time assessed that MBS orchestrated the killing. President Trump on Tuesday said that the Saudi royal "knew nothing about" the murder.
Write to Joe Flint at Joe.Flint@wsj.com and Lauren Thomas at lauren.thomas@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
November 19, 2025 13:09 ET (18:09 GMT)
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