Netflix co-chiefs Ted Sarandos and Greg Peters; Paramount CEO David Ellison Earl Gibson III/Deadline/Getty Images; Lisa Lake/Getty Images; Arturo Holmes/WireImage Share on Facebook Share on X Google Preferred Share to Flipboard Show additional share options Share on LinkedIn Share on Pinterest Share on Reddit Share on Tumblr Share on Whats App Send an Email Print the Article Post a Comment Ted Sarandos and Greg Peters aren't worried about Paramount's hostile bid for Warner Bros. The Netflix co-CEOs addressed the elephant in the room right at the beginning of a session at a UBS conference in New York Monday afternoon. "Today's move was entirely expected," Sarandos said. "We have a deal done, and we are really happy with the deal for shareholders, for consumers, it's a great way to create and protect jobs in the entertainment industry. We're super confident we are going to get it across." Related Stories Business The Gloves Are Off: Wall Street Games Out Paramount's Hostile Warner Bros. Bid Movies Ryan Coogler on Huge 'Sinners' Golden Globes Noms and WB-Netflix Sale News: "Theatrical Releases Mean Everything to Me" "I think we want to start by saying it's not our position to tell the regulators how to think about this," Peters said about regulatory scrutiny. "They have to do their work and define the market the way that they do it. Clearly, they'll do their analysis, and we'll support them with whatever they need in that regard. But if we go back to the fundamentals of this deal, we are very confident that regulators should and will approve it. At the end of the day, it's pro consumer." The executives were the main event of an otherwise typical Wall Street confab. Ten minutes before they were set to go on stage, every seat in the conference center inside UBS' New York headquarters was taken, as the back of the room filled up with people wanting to listen to what they had to say. In the conversation with UBS analyst John Hudlick, Sarandos and Peters emphasized that they do not intend to shut down parts of the company, and will operate the studios and HBO as they are currently. In fact, Sarandos reaffirmed that Netflix will be committed to theatrical releases. "In this transaction, we pick up three businesses basically that we're not currently in, meaning we have no redundancies currently, but one of them is a motion picture studio with a theatrical distribution machine," Sarandos said. "There's been a lot of speculation what we would do with this. I think it's important to note that all we are going to do with this is staying deeply committed to releasing those movies exactly the way they've released the movies today, all three of these new businesses we want to keep operating largely as they are, the theatrical business we have not talked a lot about in the past, about wanting to do it, because we've never been in that business. When this deal closes, we are in that business, and we're going to do it." "We didn't buy this company to destroy that value," he continued. As for HBO, "this is a prestige television brand that people really love, and I would say that they have been doing gymnastics to make themselves into a general entertainment brand," Sarandos said. "I think under this transaction, they don't have to do that anymore. We're already a very well established general entertainment brand. We want HBO to double down on the things that people have loved for 50 years." The pair said that unlike Paramount, they are not planning to consolidate studios, and pointed out the billions in efficiencies that Paramount is pursuing. They framed the deal as saving jobs, not cutting jobs, and that leadership at the division level at WBD would be tapped to keep doing their jobs. And they made the argument that Netflix does not dominate the streaming business at all, bringing along a graphic that was displayed on screens beside the stage, with Nielsen Gauge data that showed Netflix behind YouTube an Disney in terms of total TV time spent. If Paramount acquired Warner Bros., they would also be above Netflix, the executives argued, Their interview came just hours after Paramount, led by David Ellison, launched a hostile tender offer for Warner Bros., seeking to peel off the company from Netflix's grasp. "The Paramount offer for the entirety of WBD provides shareholders $18 billion more in cash than the Netflix consideration," Paramount said in its bid. "WBD's Board of Directors recommendation of the Netflix transaction over Paramount's offer is based on an illusory prospective valuation of Global Networks that is unsupported by the business fundamentals and encumbered by high levels of financial leverage assigned to the entity." Netflix has been strategic in its pursuit of Warner Bros., including a secret meeting between Sarandos and President Trump last month, which the deal came up. Trump subsequently called Sarandos "fantastic" but nonetheless said the deal could be "problematic." Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner is amo