Shares of Lionsgate Studios jumped over 5% on Wednesday as the studio has attracted takeover interest from multiple potential suitors in Europe.
As first reported by Reuters, Banijay, the TV production company behind shows like “Big Brother” and “Survivor,” is among the interested parties that have mulled a bid for Lionsgate.
Their interest comes after Banijay Entertainment chairman Jeff Zucker and CEO Marco Bassetti previously told TheWrap that they’d be open to more dealmaking following completion of the All3Media deal, emphasizing that “scale is key” to survive and thrive in the current media landscape.
“We’re just on day one here today. Obviously, Marco and the team have a tremendous amount of work to do to bring the two companies together, to bring the two cultures together, to find those synergies,” Zucker said last week. “But at the same time, we’re also going to be opportunistic about the coming years. We’ll look for other opportunities as they come up. We have nothing in mind today, but feel that given our incredibly strong shareholders and our strength and scale, we’ll be well positioned to take advantage of the new media ecosystem.”
Reuters notes that Bollore, the controlling owner of Canal+, has also considered a bid to bolster its production capabilities, though Variety reports that the company is not bidding. The latter adds that Mediawan, who announced a pending merger with Peter Chernin’s The North Road Company earlier this year, is also among the interested parties.
While Lionsgate has reportedly been working with an investment bank to assess potential suitors, Reuters noted that a deal is not certain and that the company could remain independent.
Representatives for Banijay and Lionsgate declined to comment. Representatives for Bollore and Mediawan did not immediately return TheWrap’s request for comment.
The interest in Europe comes as Lionsgate has long been viewed as a potential M&A target.
In 2024, activist investor Anson Funds urged Lionsgate to pursue an outright sale or asset sales following its split from Starz, which occurred the following year. TheWrap also previously reported that Legendary Entertainment was mulling a potential acquisition of Lionsgate last year.
In a December interview with CNBC, Lionsgate vice chairman Michael Burns declined to comment on the status of the talks with Legendary, but said the studio would be a “valuable asset” to “a lot of different companies” given its scale and library of premium content. At the time, he added that there are three or four companies that he believed would be a “great strategic alliance” with Lionsgate and generate cost savings, though he declined to elaborate.
In addition, Netflix told TheWrap it is “not interested and not pursuing” a Lionsgate acquisition following a report last month that the streamer was interested in the studio.
Lionsgate shares are up 113.8% in the past year and 53.6% year to date.
