CBS, Viacom Agree on Management Structure for Merger (Report)

Viacom and CBS Corp. have reached an agreement in principle to recombine in the latest entertainment industry mega-deal,The Hollywood Reporterand could be unveiled around Aug. 8, when the companies report their earnings. CBS and Viacom must still strike a final deal and get approvals for that from their boards.

But should a merger go ahead, Viacom CEO Bob Bakish is expected to lead the combined company, while CBS Corp. acting CEO Joe Ianniello has been expected to potentially remain at the company and oversee key CBS assets, excluding its cable networks.. National Amusements, led by the companies' vice chair Shari Redstone, is the controlling shareholder of both firms, which recently launched new deal talks after twice before exploring a recombination without reaching an agreement.

Consolidation to gain more scale amid competition from streaming video and technology giants has been a key focus for the entertainment sector in recent years. The CBS-Viacom deal agreement comes after Walt Disney's $71.3 billion acquisition of large parts of 21st Century Fox and AT&T's $85 billion takeover of Time Warner. CBS is also understood to have offered Lionsgate $5 billion to buy its premium TV unit Starz.

The two entertainment companies have operated as separate companies since their split in 2006. But Shari Redstone has touted the benefits of scale and is understood to have told a recent event that if CBS and Viacom combine, the merged firm could look for further deals down the line. National Amusements has in the past said that a combination "might offer substantial synergies that would allow the combined company to respond even more aggressively and effectively to the challenges of the changing entertainment and media landscape." But in a settlement with CBS last year, it agreed not to push for a Viacom-CBS deal for a couple of years, leaving any such initiative to the companies themselves.

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