ViacomCBS

On September 29, 2016, National Amusements, the parent company of CBS Corporation and Viacom, wrote to Viacom and CBS encouraging the two companies to merge back into one company.[3] On December 12, the deal was called off.[4]

On January 12, 2018, CNBC reported that Viacom had re-entered talks to merge back into CBS Corporation, after the merger of AT&T-Time Warner and Disney's proposed acquisition of most of 21st Century Fox's assets were announced. Viacom and CBS also faced heavy competition from companies such as Netflix and Amazon.[5] Shortly afterward, it was reported that the combined company could be a suitor for acquiring the film studio Lionsgate.[6] Viacom and Lionsgate were both interested in acquiring The Weinstein Company.[7] Following the Weinstein effect, Viacom was listed as one of 22 potential buyers that were interested in acquiring TWC.[7] They lost the bid, and on March 1, 2018, it was announced that Maria Contreras-Sweet would acquire all of TWC's assets for $500 million.[8][9] Lantern Capital would later acquire the Studio.

On March 30, 2018, CBS made an all-stock offer slightly below Viacom's market value, insisting that its existing leadership, including long-time chairman and CEO Les Moonves, oversee the re-combined company. Viacom rejected the offer as too low, requesting a $2.8 billion increase and that Bob Bakish be maintained as president and COO under Moonves. These conflicts had resulted from Shari Redstone seeking more control over CBS and its leadership.[10][11]

Eventually, on May 14, 2018, CBS Corporation sued National Amusements and accused Redstone of abusing her voting power in the company and forcing a merger that was not supported by it or Viacom.[12][13] CBS also accused Redstone of discouraging Verizon Communications from acquiring it, which could have been beneficial to its shareholders.[14]

On May 23, 2018, Les Moonves stated that he considered the Viacom channels to be an "albatross," and while he favored more content for CBS All Access, he believed that there were better deals for CBS than the Viacom deal, such as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Lionsgate, or Sony Pictures. Moonves also considered Bakish a threat because he did not want an ally of Shari Redstone as a board member of the combined company.[15]

On September 9, 2018, Les Moonves exited CBS following multiple accusations of sexual assault. National Amusements agreed to make no proposal of a CBS-Viacom merger for at least two years after the date of the settlement.[16]

On May 30, 2019, CNBC reported that CBS Corporation and Viacom would explore merger discussions in mid-June 2019. CBS's board of directors was revamped with people who were open to merging; the re-merger was made possible with the resignation of Moonves, who had opposed all merger attempts. The talks had started following rumors of CBS acquiring Starz from Lionsgate.[17] Reports said that CBS and Viacom reportedly set August 8 as an informal deadline for reaching an agreement to recombine the two media companies.[18][19] CBS announced to acquire Viacom as part of the re-merger deal for up to $15.4 billion.[20]

On August 2, 2019, it was reported that CBS and Viacom agreed to merge back into one entity. Both companies came to an agreement on the management team for the merger, with Bob Bakish serving as CEO of the combined company with president and acting CEO of CBS, Joseph Ianniello, overseeing CBS-branded assets.[21] On August 7, 2019, CBS and Viacom separately reported their quarterly earnings as the talks about the re-merger continued.[22][23]

On August 13, CBS and Viacom officially announced their merger; the combined company was to be named ViacomCBS, with Shari Redstone serving as chairwoman.[24][25][26]

Upon the merger agreement, Viacom and CBS jointly announced that the transaction is expected to close by the end of 2019, pending regulatory and shareholder approvals.[27] The merger must be approved by the Federal Trade Commission.[27]

On October 28, the merger was approved by National Amusements, which then announced the deal would close in early December; the recombined company will trade its shares on Nasdaq under the symbols "VIAC" and "VIACA" after CBS Corporation delist its shares on the New York Stock Exchange.[28][29]

On November 25, Viacom and CBS announced the merger would close on December 4 and begin trading Nasdaq on December 5.[30][31] On December 4, 2019, Bakish confirmed that the ViacomCBS merger had closed.[32]

On December 10, Bakish announced that ViacomCBS would look to divest Black Rock, the building that held CBS's headquarters since 1964. He stated, "Black Rock is not an asset we need to own and we believe that money would be put to better use elsewhere..."[33] That same day, the company and its Paramount Pictures subsidiary resumed talks with Miramax (and its owner beIN Media Group) to acquire a stake in the company.[34] On December 20, 2019, the company agreed to purchase a 49% stake in Miramax (beIN maintained a 51% majority stake), with Paramount announcing an exclusive agreement for their library and upcoming films.[35]

On February 6, 2020, CNBC reported that ViacomCBS was preparing to launch a streaming service that would blend CBS All Access, Paramount films and its media properties such as Nickelodeon, MTV and Pluto TV, among others, which have been licensed to other services like Netflix and Amazon's Prime Video.[36]

In March 2020, EVP Dana McClintock announced his resignation from the company after 27 years in CBS Communications.[37] CEO Bob Bakish announced on March 4 that the company would potentially sell the Simon & Schuster publishing unit, stating that "it does not have significant connection for our broader business.”[38]

On May 21, 2020, ViacomCBS announced that it had acquired John Krasinski's web series Some Good News, following a bidding war. The series will be produced by Comedy Central Productions. While Krasinski will no longer host the show, he will maintain some on-screen presence and will serve as the show's executive producer.[39] After receiving criticism on social media for the selling the show to the network, Krasinski defended the sale, saying that he had not planned on producing more than eight episodes of the show, and was focused on other commitments such as Jack Ryan. [40][39] New episodes will first stream on CBS All Access, before moving to other networks within the company.

Following the departure of Thierry Cammas, Jaime Ondarza takes the lead of ViacomCBS Networks International for France, Spain, Italy, the Middle East, Greece and Turkey.[41]