AT&T Inc. has agreed to buy Time Warner Inc. in a deal worth about $80 billion, bringing disparate assets including satellite TV provider DirecTV, cell phone network AT&T Wireless, the Warner Bros. movie studio and HBO and Turner cable channels under one umbrella, The Wall St. Journal reported Saturday.
The deal could be announced as soon as Saturday evening, and would have AT&T pay between $105 and $110 per share of Time Warner, the Journal reported.
The proceeds would be paid half in cash and half in stock. Both companies’ boards are currently meeting to discuss and approve the transaction, which would be the largest media merger since AOL’s ill-fated $165 billion purchase of Time Warner in 2000.
AT&T has been on a buying spree lately as it seeks to diversify further into video entertainment from its telecom roots. Last year, the company acquired satellite TV provider DirecTV for $49 billion, and it is launching a DirecTV-branded over-the-top streaming service later this year.
Buying Time Warner also gives AT&T 10 percent of Hulu, the streaming service Time Warner invested in earlier this year that is preparing to roll out its own live-TV service early next year. Between its Warner Bros. television and movie production businesses, HBO and its Turner channels, Time Warner has plenty of premium content to supply AT&T’s increasing amount of delivery systems.
Golden Parachutes: See How Much These 10 Execs Got Paid to Leave (Photos)
Philippe Dauman, Marissa Mayer and Michael Ovitz are among a handful of entertainment and tech executives who were handed handsome sums of money while they were being forced out the door. (Please note: All totals are from SEC filings and other official sources.)
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Name: Philippe Dauman Company: Viacom Payday: $72 million Sumner Redstone's former protege -- and for years, one of America's highest-paid CEOs -- took home $72 million as part of a settlement that will see him depart the embattled media company in September.
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Name: Roger Ailes Company: Fox News Payday: $40 million Ailes left the news network he essentially built after a lawsuit filed by a former Fox News anchorwoman led to an investigation, and several other women coming forward accusing Ailes of sexual assault. Ailes resigned two weeks after the lawsuit was filed and received $40 million.
Fox News
Name: Michael Ovitz Company: The Walt Disney Company Payday: $140 million Not a CEO, the co-founder of Creative Artists Agency made $140 million in less than a year's work as the executive president of Disney, when he was fired by then-CEO Michael Eisner, triggering a severance package that was built into his deal -- and which Disney shareholders unsuccessfully tried to have returned in court.
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Name: Carly Fiorina Company: Hewlett-Packard Payday: $21 million The former Republican presidential candidate -- and Ted Cruz's presumptive running mate -- pocketed $21 million when she was forced to resign after orchestrating a disastrous acquisition of Compaq.
Fox News
Name: Marissa Mayer Company: Yahoo Payday: $55 million Mayer hasn't yet committed to leaving, but she's widely expected to depart the top job after Yahoo agreed to be purchased by Verizon for $4.8 billion. Mayer is guaranteed $55 million in severance if she loses her job or if there is a change in control.
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Name: Henrique de Castro Company: Yahoo Payday: $58 billion It turns out there is actually a good time to get fired: Mayer canned de Castro, Yahoo's chief operating officer, in 2014, but his heavily stock-based severance package was worth a robust $58 million, as Yahoo's stock had swelled at the time due to its ownership interest in Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba.
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Name: Tom Freston Company: Viacom Payday: $85 million Freston, Dauman's precedessor and the man who essentially built MTV, was fired by Redstone in 2006. One of the biggest reasons: his failure to buy MySpace, which News Corp. eventually sold in 2011 for a $545 million loss.
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Name: Rob Marcus Company: Time Warner Cable Payday: $93 million Time Warner Cable was acquired by Charter Communications earlier this year, making his CEO job redundant. Marcus walked away with nearly $100 million after two-and-a-half years of work.
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Name: Jack Welch Company: General Electric Payday: $417 million GE's pugnacious boss scored the granddaddy of all severance packages, walking away with a monster deal that only became public during a divorce settlement that mandated the disclosure of his retirement benefits.
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Name: Amy Pascal Company: Sony Payday: Four-year production deal, valued at $40 million Pascal, whose personal emails were exposed as a result of the Sony hack landing her in hot water regarding references to President Obama -- was fired as co-chair of Sony's film division in the wake of the scandal. She got a production deal -- not uncommon for high-level studio execs -- that has her attached to some of the studio's biggest franchises, including "Spider-Man" and "Ghostbusters."
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Philippe Dauman is the second consecutive Viacom CEO to walk away with a monster severance package
Philippe Dauman, Marissa Mayer and Michael Ovitz are among a handful of entertainment and tech executives who were handed handsome sums of money while they were being forced out the door. (Please note: All totals are from SEC filings and other official sources.)
Getty Images
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