For one, housing broadcast network NBC creates various obstacles. The company wouldn’t be able to merge with a company that has another national network, effectively taking
Disney, the owner of ABC, and CBS owner Paramount Skydance off the table.
Even eliminating the broadcasters from the equation, a deal with Paramount Skydance — which has been on something of a shopping spree under new CEO David Ellison — would be a stretch following the completion of its deal with WBD.
Fox, the remaining major player in linear TV, has
stayed away from traditional media after hiving off its entertainment assets years ago and likely doesn’t have the appetite for another deal after its Roku agreement.
With the WBD sale process, Netflix showed it
was open to doing deals — for the right assets.
But Netflix’s interest in WBD was in its film studio and streaming assets, casting aside WBD’s linear networks. Even with major sports properties like the NFL’s Sunday Ticket, the NBA and top film content, it’s hard to imagine Netflix would make such a shift and get into linear TV via a hypothetical deal with NBCUniversal.
That leaves little else on the table when it comes to media deals, with the largest players all pretty much spoken for. Comcast didn’t specify Monday what it expects either company to be valued at post-spin, but between the Universal theme parks business, a substantial, albeit small, streamer and a respected content library, NBCUniversal would likely be too large for a smaller player to swallow.