Bids from Netflix and Paramount Skydance to buy Warner Bros. Discovery both raise antitrust concerns including the question of market definition as audiences view more user-generated content. Jennifer Huddleston, senior tech fellow at the Cato Institute, discusses the issues with Caroline Hyde and Ed Ludlow on "Bloomberg Tech."

A proposed deal involving Warner Bros. is set to undergo regulatory review due to its scale and the updated antitrust guidelines established in 2023. Regulators will focus on defining the relevant market, whether it is online streaming, the broader attention economy, or general entertainment, and will assess the potential impact on consumers, including prices and quality.

The review will not be limited to the United States, as international regulators, particularly in Europe, may also scrutinize the transaction. Companies involved, such as Netflix, have argued that the deal could benefit consumers and content creation, but the market definition—potentially including both studio and user-generated content—will be a central issue in the regulatory process.

Antitrust concerns around Warner Bros. offers

A proposed deal of this scale and size and value is inevitably going to be looked at by regulators and reviewed in part because we have a set of codified guidelines and rules from 2023 that allow for that to be the case. When regulators do look at it. Jennifer what is the top consideration about this market that they'll be making. Thank you so much for having me. And you're right. One of the things we're going to see in this conversation is how do these 2023 guidelines potentially play out in this case. And what does that mean if such ends up in court as well as what does that mean for any challenges. One of the interesting things is going to really be around this question of market definition. What is the market that these two platforms are potentially competing in. And what does that mean for the actual average consumer. Is this online streaming subscription services. Is this some kind of bigger attention economy issue or is this something specific about the amount of time individuals spend on any type of entertainment as it goes about. Jennifer will any of the regulators involved look at what the benefit is to the consumer in either merger or deal going through. I mean we can certainly hope so. U.S. antitrust law is supposed to be based in the consumer welfare standard which means what regulators should really be looking at is will this merger acquisition harm consumers in some way. Will it negatively impact prices. Will it negatively impact the ability to have to have a certain quality or certain other elements that really should be based on sound economic factors. This shouldn't be about a subjective idea of how many players should be in the streaming market. It should really be focused on this question of our consumers going to be harmed. Our consumers going to be worse off if they have this combined company as opposed to two separate companies. The Cato Institute is so interesting because it's a libertarian think tank and it's really thinking about individual liberty about limited government free markets. You come at it from that angle. But Jennifer give us your global perspective here a bit because this doesn't just get sign off from the United States. We go worldwide. We're just seeing what the EU is doing again today for example with alphabet and competition within a.I.. Are they going to hit roadblocks there as well. I mean that's certainly going to be a question depending on the nature of any particular transaction. And we've seen this happen in other cases when it comes to questions around large U.S. tech companies and their potential acquisitions. For example we certainly saw a large debate around the Microsoft Activision acquisition in Europe as well. And ultimately that was able to go through. We've also seen European regulators trying to put up various structural roadblocks that would allow some of America's leading tech companies to continue to innovate to continue to go into new markets. So I think it's certainly a worthy question of not only how might such transactions play out when it comes to U.S. regulators but if this is something that's a global international debate are there other regulators where there might be other conversations that get had along the way. It's interesting Jennifer that Netflix has tried to front run a lot of these concerns by putting out the statement that consumers will win from that perspective because already they're signed up to Netflix and HBO. And more broadly they'll probably get more bang for the buck. But they're also having to talk about how they're going to benefit content creation or indeed the industry of Hollywood writ large. Should they have to do that. Will the narrative be based on that in any way as to how this might help jobs and creativity. I think one of the big questions is going to be around that market definition is the market. The definition definition include markets for content creation. And if so what does that mean in our debt in this day and age where we have such significant amounts of user generated content. Is it only about studio created content or is it also about looking at content more holistically the way short form video or even long form video on platforms like YouTube have arisen to allow creatives new outlets. So we'll certainly see that be part of the conversation as well possibly if that gets included in the market definition.

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Canberra

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