Reports that David Ellison is considering moving Paramount Skydance out of California have caused a thunderous round of commentary in the media world. Inside the company, employees say they have bigger concerns.
Nine Paramount employees who spoke with Business Insider said they weren’t worried about the company’s potential move, either because they didn’t think it was likely or because they’re based elsewhere.
Instead, they said they are more focused on what would happen to their jobs if and when Paramount’s $110 billion merger with Warner Bros. Discovery goes through.
One employee said they breathed a “small sigh of relief” when Paramount’s merger with WBD was put on pause because of an antitrust case from 12 states. They said they feel “mostly secure” in their job until at least March, when the trial is scheduled to begin.
Still, they added that they’re “trying to come up with Plan B, just in case.”
‘Another deliberate pressure tactic’
Ellison has told Paramount’s leadership that he’s considering setting up shop in Tennessee, Texas, Georgia, or elsewhere if California AG Rob Bonta isn’t willing to negotiate a settlement of the antitrust lawsuit that has paused the deal by October, Puck News reported this week.
A Paramount spokesperson referred Business Insider to comments made by Makan Delrahim, the company’s chief legal officer, at a Politico event on Tuesday. Delrahim said “some of the internal conversations were leaked” about Ellison’s plan to leave California and said that the company is “certainly at the point where we are considering those factors.”
Ellison’s decision to float moving Paramount’s headquarters “reads like another deliberate pressure tactic,” analyst Rich Greenfield of LightShed Partners wrote in a Tuesday note.
One New York-based Paramount staffer said they “like the aggressiveness” from Ellison — though they don’t know how moving out of California “would work in practice.”
Paramount’s “power bases are centered on LA and NYC,” Greenfield wrote, so requiring thousands of staffers to move from California would be a huge logistical undertaking and “disruptive” to employees.
‘It’s nice to be able to focus’
Instead of a potential relocation, Paramount staffers who spoke to Business Insider said they are much more focused on the company’s pending deal with WBD — and what it could mean for their careers.
“It’s nice to be able to focus on what we do without the impending disruption that a merger in 2026 would have brought,” a high-level advertising employee said of the merger delay.
One major headache for Paramount is the roughly $7 million per day fee its financial backers would owe WBD shareholders for each day the deal doesn’t close, starting after September 30.
That ticking fee, or the $7 billion breakup fee that Paramount would owe WBD if the deal doesn’t close, has some staffers worried that tougher days are ahead for the company financially.
“I’m at an age where walking away is an option,” a veteran streaming employee said. “But it isn’t for most, and there is absolutely concern.”
