Elon Musk invested $1 billion in Skydance, Semafor reports

Elon Musk has invested approximately $1 billion in the newly formed media company Skydance, according to a report from Semafor published on Thursday. The report, citing people familiar with the matter, says Musk’s investment was made around the same time as equity contributions from other Skydance investors, including board member Laurene Powell Jobs.

The investment lands weeks after Paramount completed its $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery on 6 October, creating the combined Skydance company led by co-chief executives David Ellison and Ynon Kreiz, which Flip News covered at the time. The combined portfolio includes the Paramount+ and HBO Max streaming services alongside networks including CBS and CNN.

Semafor says the investment will give the company a financial boost as it seeks to cut costs and lift its share price. Skydance has committed to reducing costs by $6 billion over the next three years.

Musk’s ties to the Ellison family are long-standing: Larry Ellison, David Ellison’s father, invested $1 billion to help Musk buy Twitter in 2022 and also invested in Tesla in 2018.

Skydance did not immediately respond to TechCrunch’s request for comment.

The report also comes days after media executive John Malone suggested at the Paley Center that a transaction between Skydance and Musk’s SpaceX — potentially worth $8 billion to $10 billion — was possible. That was Malone’s speculation, not an announced deal.