Company: WBD
Filing Date: 2025-12-10
Form Type: DFAN14A
Source: 0001193125-25-314445
Chunk: 4

Company: Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc.
Filing Date: 2025-12-10
Form: DFAN14A
Chunk 4
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 review process and deliver this transaction to you and our other stakeholders.

WBD’s transaction with Netflix, on the other hand, appears to be in for a long and bumpy ride as it navigates the global regulatory review process. Netflix is the #1 streaming business globally by subscriber count and HBO Max is #4. Combining these two yields an overwhelming market share of ~43% – more than 2x the #2. This is in addition to the other serious competition concerns raised, including from vertically integrating WBD’s film and TV production studios into Netflix, which will give Netflix greater leverage over theatrical exhibitors and creative talent alike. Notably, and as an indicator of its global dominance, Netflix’s current equity market capitalization dwarfs that of all other major media companies and theatrical exhibitors combined (even after the above-mentioned $110+ billion loss in value):

| (1) | Based on unaffected price as of September 10, 2025 (prior to WSJ leak). |

Outside the United States, Netflix’s regulatory path is particularly challenged in Europe where its dominance is far more entrenched. Our analysis was conducted by the former deputies of merger enforcements for the European Commission and the U.K.’s Competition and Markets Authority . Netflix is by far the dominant streaming service in Europe, accounting for 51% of the total European OTT subscription revenue in 2024, with Disney a distant second at only 10%. The acquisition of WBD’s Streaming & Studios business is a blatant attempt to eliminate one of Netflix’s only viable international competitors in HBO Max . Market share analysis aside, Netflix also needs to satisfy Europe’s new landmark Digital Services Act and Digital Markets Act created for a situation precisely like this – protecting consumers from Big Tech overreach.

The argument being advanced publicly by Netflix and its proxies states that regulators should ignore the SVOD market and instead utilize a gerrymandered market definition that includes services like YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook. Netflix’s claim boils down to trying to mask its dominance in SVOD by grouping together all internet-enabled video, media, social media, or otherwise.No regulator has ever accepted such a broad approach to market definition, and to do so would require regulators to give up on merger enforcement in media and social media alike.

It is noteworthy that, unlike Paramount’s willingness to agree to remedies up to a “material adverse effect” on the combined company, Netflix’s regulatory remedy commitments expressly state no remedy whatsoever can be imposed on Netflix’s business. Netflix also has a longer timeline