Paramount Sells India TV Stake To Reliance For $517 Million

Paramount Global sold its 13% stake in its Indian TV business to its partner, Reliance Industries Ltd., for $517 million.

Christopher Palmeri

14 Mar 2024, 08:45 AM IST

The Paramount Global headquarters in New York, US, on Thursday, Dec. 21, 2023. Warner Bros. Discovery Inc. held talks on a possible merger with Paramount Global, potentially combining two of the biggest media companies in the world, according to people with knowledge of the matter. Photographer: Gabby Jones/Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- Paramount Global agreed to sell its 13% stake in its Indian TV business to its partner, Reliance Industries Ltd., for $517 million.

The deal comes after Reliance and Walt Disney Co. agreed to merge their TV properties in the country last month, in a deal that valued the combined business at $8.5 billion.

Reliance and Paramount were partners in Viacom 18 Media Private Ltd., which owns a number of TV channels in the region. Paramount will continue to license its programming to Viacom 18, according to a filing Wednesday by the US company.

Paramount, the parent of CBS, Nickelodeon and other networks, has been looking to reduce its debt by selling noncore assets like its Simon & Schuster book publishing arm. Bloomberg News reported earlier on the company’s talks to sell its Indian TV stake.

(Updates with details on deal in third paragraph. The date of Disney’s sale was corrected in an earlier version.)

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