Negative. CBS had no debt and made money. Viacom was the dying debt ridden company.
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even big shots are being let go that have connections that are high rollers. the layoffs are brutal
The pipe dream is believing the future of Paramount is good. Both CBS & Viacom were billions in debt years before the merger, they're looking to cut $2 billion more. Anybody who thinks this is good is either drinking or serving the Kool aid. Both CBS & Viacom have been falling off the viewership map for 20 years. Vh-1 and MTV peaked when I was in high school. FCC Carr has just said it's going to be a very long process. This is not a rubber stamp merger
Any idea that merger is being called off is a pipe dream. There’s something called insurance and while us regular folks don’t specialize in it, it’s all that corporate thinks about. Even if it’s not covered by insurance, corporate will find some accounting trick to make it work. F.C.C.? New owners will find some way to save face and give their drop of blood to make things work. No one in the news is seriously predicting that the deal won’t happen. Shari will never pull out and rich like the Ellisons aren’t scared by any of this. Don’t forget that they are underpaying in the billions with inflated valuation of Skydance. Yes the company is worthless everyday but not by enough for this to be a bad deal for them.
I was a non exempt full time employee for years, and did not have unlimited vacation - my unused days all went to waste when I was let go in December.
Just to add fact that studios in LA are halting productions as wildfires approach because employees homes are in peril. The other thing is that if wildfires take down TV & Film studios - that's good reason for them to cut hundreds & hundreds to get closer to $2 Billion in cuts & may also definitely call off merger if skydance and/or paramount studios are reduced to ashes
Well of course you're not going to be paid unlimited vacation.
To the person that wrote about severance pay you are incorrect. I was laid off. No vacation pay nor sick pay was paid out. Don’t be fooled by “unlimited vacation” perks. They know most people will be too busy to take a lot of vacation time each year. And when they lay you off they don’t have to pay you for unused days
3 more in cali posted on 3/14 on warn
Another WARN notice posted 1/3 to amend prior notices about a small number of layoffs on 3/14/25
This being prior to the takeover probably doesn't include Skydance's 2 billion cost cuts.
https://dol.ny.gov/system/files/documents/2025/01/amended-warn-nyc-paramount-global-2.13.24-amended-12.11.24-2023-0251-through-2024-0072.pdf
The severance terms have been the same forever. What changed ? You get A weeks pay for every year you worked & you get unemployment & the unused sick pay / vacation . What exactly changed that people were expecting anything more than usual. It's standard corporate severance
where are the 2 billion in cuts going to come from ?
Hmm, when thinking about that 2 bill the ellisons want to save ... as much as I know a lot of folks laid off were not happy with severance terms, I wouldn't be surprised if the new owners have an even less generous policy...
Google Cindy holland skydance
Am concerned about the H1-B status with the company. Got a renewal coming up soon and there is not anyone that is providing directions around immigrations after the latest layoffs in sept24. Does anyone know what the situation in other departments are like?
to the poster below
who is the new streaming head?
They should start by laying off the low hanging fruit: overpaid c suite executives, remote workers, and redundant employees.
For those who get stip bonus, I think this is going to be the last year we have it in its known form. Not sure how, but I can see the newly extended hr chief finding a way to ingratiate herself to new owners by making the perf review process a lot more involved w stip for everyone. The new streaming head is from Netflix, where I heard that you were treated like a fantasy player, and they looked at competitors employees as players they could drop you for on an annual basis. And that’s what may be coming for those who don’t get fired.
Skydance did say they were looking at 2 billion in cost cutting in July. That was not part of the 3 CEO 500mil cut 3 phase plan announced in June and executed throughout the year. It seems more layoffs will come when Skydance takes over, end of Q1 unless they go with the typical Feb 14ish layoff date. It's hard to tell where cuts will come from but there is a lot of redundancies here. Best of luck to everyone and Happy New Year!
How everybody is feeling about 2025 is an irrelevant subject that leads to rumor & innuendo and takes up space. Somebody here has an obsession with posting innocuous posts just to satisfy their compulsive behavior which includes the need for attention & probably tied to other compulsive behavior like drinking, gambling etc. worst thing to start off a new year with rumor, fear, negativity etc.
AI will not just replace people in multiple fields, not just media. It could easy to have Finance people replaced with AI to crunch numbers endlessly, etc.
Based on some recent articles …
Skydance is not a super profitable company. It has no franchises and is not worth what paramount is technically paying to buy it. The main value is shari getting a payoff and an unimpressive cash infusion for paramount from Ellison. What proof do we have that they have what it takes to make this a successful business? A lot of really experienced reporters keep saying it’s great to be backed by one of the richest guys in the world. That’s true. The only way paramount succeeds is by a lot of upfront investment in content and to some extent tech. The rich don’t get that way by throwing money at things irresponsibly, so it’s hard to predict what will happen. I can see a lot of cuts coming. Skydance is a lean company staff wise (making their limited profitability more stark of a point). Younger ellison is not dad. He has no experience creating or running a successful public company, so it will depend on what shell and other hires do. Will dad give him a big blank check? If I was them I’d focus hard on sports rights acquisition, analytics, p+ interface and series content. Movies would be last, but that’s Ellisons main playground. A ton of folks will get fired on the network side and on the studio side everyone will have new bosses. You need to start finding ways to work tech, and ai into your resumes and profiles. Old studios will blindly grab those for interviews without regard to any ability to do basic work or be creative. Yay. The future isn’t getting better in media. Its gonna be time for a lot of us to work in media less directly or in other industries altogether.
To the person that is criticizing this post: how is this post not relevant to this layoff site? This site meant for discussing layoffs. This post is specifically asking how everyone is feeling about 2025 and what could be in store.
Who are you to tell people what not to post? Step off!
It doesn't seem that many people that get laid off share anything on this site
This is NOT Facebook, stop with the compulsive posts every day that have nothing to do with the site. fortune magazine article today says 2,000 laid off in 2024 - more than all the comparable media combined
- Article says Sept 24 there were hundreds of employees on zoom call & told that in an hour those that were being laid off would be notified. How did nobody talk about this here?