Paramount CEO Bob Bakish resigns amid merger talks

By Lisa Richwine

(Reuters) -Paramount Global CEO Bob Bakish is stepping down and will be replaced by three executives, the company said on Monday as it reported quarterly earnings that beat Wall Street expectations.

CBS President and CEO George Cheeks, Paramount Pictures studio chief Brian Robbins, and Chris McCarthy, head of Showtime/MTV Entertainment and the Paramount Media Networks, will lead the company in a new Office of the CEO.

Shares of the media conglomerate, which is in exclusive merger talks with David Ellison's Skydance Media, rose nearly 1% in after-hours trading to $12.36.

The new CEO office is working with Paramount's board "to develop a comprehensive, long-range plan to accelerate growth and develop popular content, materially streamline operations, strengthen the balance sheet, and continue to optimize the streaming strategy," the company said in a statement.

Bakish had led the company since the 2019 merger with CBS to form ViacomCBS, later branded as Paramount Global. He took the helm of Viacom in 2016.

For the quarter that ended in March, Paramount reported adjusted earnings per share of 62 cents, well ahead of the 36 cents consensus of analysts.

Revenue came in shy of expectations at $7.69 billion. Wall Street had forecast $7.73 billion, according to LSEG data.

Paramount has been in discussions with Skydance about a possible deal for months. The combination has upset some shareholders who say it would benefit controlling shareholder Shari Redstone at their expense. They have urged Paramount to consider other suitors including Apollo Global Management.

The Redstone family and Skydance, which has backed Paramount films such as "Top Gun: Maverick," recently offered concessions to try to make the Skydance bid more attractive, Bloomberg reported on Sunday.

(Reporting by Lisa Richwine in Los Angeles, and Harshita Mary Varghese and Akash Sriram in BengaluruEditing by Shilpi Majumdar and Matthew Lewis)