David Zaslav, the head of Warner Bros. Discovery, could potentially secure a windfall of approximately $500 million if the company is sold close to the $56 billion offer that David Ellison’s Paramount has reportedly made.

This estimate is derived from details within Zaslav’s executive contract, as reported by Semafor. Paramount recently proposed to purchase Warner Bros. Discovery at $23.50 per share, shortly after the company was put up for sale earlier this week.

The news of Zaslav’s potential financial gain follows earlier announcements that CNN will be spun off to a separate company next year, mirroring Comcast’s plans for MSNBC. This move aims to mitigate the challenges posed by declining linear assets like CNN.

Warner Bros. Discovery has stated that it will proceed with the previously announced separation, but it remains open to alternative structural changes if a suitable merger opportunity arises during the sale process.

The strategy was designed to alleviate sag created by declining linear assets like CNN.

The company this week said it will continue to work on the previously announced split that while it shops itself around but, ‘will also consider an alternative separation structure that would enable a merger of’ both companies if a buyer is interested.  

CNN laid off 200 workers from its TV division back in January, as part of an ongoing cost-cutting mission masterminded by Zaslav and his former chief financial officer, Gunnar Wiedenfels.

Together, the two have managed to strip some $21billion of the entertainment company’s once $55billion debt.

Warner Bros. Discovery boss David Zaslav is set to rake in roughly $500million if the company is sold near the $56billion David Ellison’s Paramount has already offered 

CNN is already set to cast off to an entirely different company next year to address declines surrounding linear assets like the network’s cable channel

The cuts, however, had done little to help the conglomerate’s share price, which was down roughly 50 percent when Warner Bros. Discovery announced it will consider offers last Tuesday. 

It has since spiked about 25 percent. The drops took place entirely during Zaslav’s tenure. He took the reigns following Warner Bros. $44billion merger with Discovery in 2022. Both he and Wiedenfels had led Discovery in the years before. 

Zaslav went on to promise that CNN would stay where it is, despite waning viewership. That changed last summer when the soon-to-be cable spinoff, Global Networks, was announced. Wiedenfels was minted as its CEO in June.

The winner of the inevitable bidding war set to be spawned by Zaslav’s failures would obtain assets like Warner Bros. Pictures, HBO, and the recently reinstated HBO Max.

Also potentially on the table are CNN, HGTV, TBS, TNT, the Food Network and other struggling cable channels currently set to be cast of to the new company. 

Most of the current company’s remaining debt ‘is going to live with’ the new company, Wiedendfels told analysts in June.

He added that an unspecified, ‘not-insignificant portion’ would stay on the streaming side.

A costly bidding war that could reshape the country’s media landscape is now rapidly emerging.

Ellison – the son of billionaire GOP donor Larry Ellison – has made three offers for the company since September, after taking control of Paramount in July

Apart from Paramount – which solidified its own merger with Ellison’s Skydance this past July – candidates include Comcast, Netflix, and Amazon. 

Ellison – the son of billionaire GOP donor Larry Ellison – so far appears the most interested. He has made three offers to buy the company since September, The New York Times revealed Tuesday. 

All of the offers were made before Warner Bros. Discovery’s announcement Tuesday.

The most recent  on October 13 was the one used by Semafor to tabulate the sum Zaslav could soon collect.

Meanwhile, CNN mainstays like Anderson Cooper and Jake Tapper continue to collect eight-figure salaries as well.

The media giant recently disclosed that nearly 60 percent of its shareholders voted to reject the pay packages for Zaslav and Wiedenfels, and after Zaslav saw his compensation swell by nearly five percent from 2023 to 2024.

Zaslav’s prospective pay package included $3million in salary, $23.1million in stock, $23.9million in non-equity incentive plan compensation and $1.92million for things like a car allowance and personal security. 

Warner Bros. Discovery’s board of directors had recommended that shareholders vote the other way, to no avail.

The sale would see Warner Bros. Pictures, HBO, and HBO Max transferred to the buyer. CNN, HGTV, TBS, TNT, the Food Network and other cable channels could be bought as well, the company said

Altogether, Zaslav has been awarded $470million in compensation since 2019, including a $200 million package when his contract was renewed just before the merger in 2021.

A government official said to have direct knowledge on the company’s potential sale told the New York Post Thursday that the Trump administration favors Ellison and Paramount over other candidates.

They added they expect other companies to face obstacles in obtaining federal approval as a result.

Comcast, the parent company of NBC, recently made a donation towards Donald Trump’s $300million White House construction project. 

The company has yet to place a bid. It acquired NBC Universal from General Electric in 2011 for $13.7billion.