Looks like the streaming wars are just getting
started.
News of Amazon in talks to acquire MGM has emerged within hours of the announcement of the merger of WarnerMedia and Discovery Inc.
Amazon has offered somewhere in the range
of $7 billion to $10 billion for the iconic studio, according to The Information, which first reported the news. Variety followed with a report citing $9 million.
MGM has been up
for sale since December 2020.
While a deal is by no means certain, the new competitive juggernaut created by the WarnerMedia/Discovery merger could add impetus to close it.
Amazon has
been pumping up its Prime Video streamer’s content with originals — drawing 12 Academy Award nominations this year — but owning MGM’s assets could help it better compete with
Netflix and Disney+, who are pouring billions into creating and acquiring content.
MGM has a library of 17,000 hours of television and 4,000 films — including rights to the James Bond
films, still among the most valuable franchises in history, as well as classic hits such as “Fargo,” “Robocop” and “The Silence of the Lambs.”
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