EXCLUSIVE: The new-look Skydance is worth just $29B due to its huge debt pile, according to media analyst Evan Shapiro.
The former NBC, Participant Media and IFC exec, who now maps the media landscape through his ESHAP business, said the valuation was down to both the $81B debt that Skydance assumed on day one of trading and its links to major shareholder Oracle, which is has long-term debts of over $160B due to investments in AI.
Shapiro is talking at MIPCOM Cannes this week, where he will unveil the latest edition of his Media Universe Map, which will be the first that is interactive and allows users to compare entertainment and tech ecosystems of the past to 2026.
“One of the puzzles we needed to solve in making this map was figuring out what the name of Paramount/WBD would be and, more importantly, WTF Skydance is actually worth,” he said ahead of his talk. “No one in their right mind would buy the $81B in debt they are carrying and no one who isn’t high as a kite would buy Skydance for the $111B price that was just paid for WBD.
“One of the biggest reasons for that is that the fortunes of Skydance and Oracle are now intrinsically intertwined, and combined they have $240B of debt, a good portion of which is either junk or a millimeter above junk. To put that in perspective the Ellisons now carry more in debt than all of Disney is worth.”
Shapiro claimed this meant his team had to determine a net asset value for Skydance, which came in at just $29B, far below the value David Ellison’s Paramount paid for WBD.
We have reached out to Skydance for comment.
The latest Media Universe Map highlights the dominance of tech companies, with Nvidia’s value the largest at $5.3T, followed by Apple ($4.9T), Alphabet ($4.3T), Microsoft ($3.8T), Amazon ($2.8T) and Meta ($1.8T). Larry Ellison’s Oracle, which is a major shareholder in the American version of Chinese social platform business Bytedance, was valued at $429B.
Of the pureplay media and entertainment businesses, Netflix was the largest with a valuation of $293B, ahead of Disney ($187B). Comcast was at $73B, while Fox was just $25B, though this is set to almost double when it completes its deal for Roku, which is valued at $23B.
India’s Reliance, which houses Disney-backed streamer JioHotstar, was at $164B, Sony came in at $144B. Both companies have assets well beyond the media space.
Shapiro, who describes his role as a media cartographer, has been rolling out his media maps for six years and is unveiling the first interactive version this week in Cannes. As he has described in the past, he claims there had been a fundamental shift in media ownership in recent years, which the map demonstrates.
“The biggest change in the Media Universe since I started mapping it is the shift from an industry controlled by C-suites to an ecosystem controlled by the consumers,” he said. “We are now in the ‘user-centric era,’ so I felt it was only fitting to put control of my map in the hands of the users. This new Media Universe Map App does just that – allowing you to drive the map yourself, on desktop or mobile, and double click on anything and everything you want more of.”
He added that the functionality would allow users of his program to compare today’s landscape with those of yesteryear.
“One of the things I get asked for most in my map, is a way back machine to compare years past to today’s map,” he said. “This new user-driven map does just that – we’ve included a time machine to allow you to compare and contract the media universe from years and eras gone by to the latest landscape.”