Elon Musk Puts $1 Billion Into the Company That Now Owns CNN and CBS
Elon Musk has invested roughly $1 billion in Skydance, the media company formed when Paramount closed its roughly $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery earlier this month. Semafor first reported the equity stake, citing people familiar with the matter. CNBC and others have since confirmed the same figure.
The cash arrives as Skydance grapples with nearly $80 to $87 billion in debt from the merger and targets more than $6 billion in cost savings over three years. That plan will almost certainly mean significant layoffs and operational cuts across studios, streaming services, and news divisions. The new company controls Paramount and Warner Bros. studios, HBO Max, Paramount+, CBS News, and CNN.
Musk’s move tightens longstanding business ties with the Ellison family. Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, father of Skydance leader David Ellison, previously committed $1 billion to Musk’s 2022 acquisition of Twitter, now X, and has guaranteed tens of billions in financing for the Warner deal. David Ellison and co-CEO Ynon Kreiz are now tasked with integrating the combined operations while servicing the massive debt load.
Legacy outlets that spent years prioritizing narrative over audience trust now face basic arithmetic. High debt, declining cable revenue, and competition from independent platforms leave little room for the old model.
An equity infusion from Musk, who has publicly criticized institutional media bias and rebuilt X around freer speech, places him inside the ownership structure of two of the most prominent remaining broadcast news brands.
Whether that produces measurable changes in coverage or simply provides capital for restructuring remains to be seen, but the financial pressure is already forcing the issue.