Good day, and welcome to the special meeting of stockholders of Warner Bros. Discovery. I would now like to turn the conference over to Samuel Di Piazza, Board Chair.
Thank you. Will the meeting please come to order? Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'd like to welcome you to the special meeting of the stockholders of Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. I'm Samuel Di Piazza, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Warner Bros. Discovery, and I'll be presiding over this meeting. We're holding this special meeting solely by means of virtual communications to allow our stockholders to participate from any location across the world. All of the members of the WBD board of directors are in attendance today. I would like to thank the WBD board for their continued leadership and support, particularly over the last year as we navigated the strategic review process that led us to approve the merger agreement with Paramount Skydance Corporation that we are submitting to you, our stockholders, for approval today.
Your board served you, the investors, with commitment, courage, and a deep sense of responsibility to creating shareholder value. I am proud to be a member of this board. Also in attendance today are several members of the WBD senior management team. David Zaslav, President, CEO, and a member of your board of directors. Gunnar Wiedenfels, Chief Financial Officer. Bruce Campbell, Chief Revenue and Strategy Officer, and a key point in structuring this transaction. Priya Aiyar, Chief Legal Officer. Robert Gibbs, Chief Communications and Public Affairs Officer. Also in attendance are Tara Smith, Executive Vice President, Corporate Secretary of the company, and Peter Lee, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations. Ms. Smith, as secretary of the company, has informed me and presented proof by affidavit that the notice of the meeting has been duly given to the stockholders of record.
Ms. Smith, please annex the affidavit to the minutes of this meeting. Ms. Aiyar will now review some preliminary matters for this meeting.
Thank you, Mr. Di Piazza. The meeting agenda and the rules of conduct for today's meeting are available on our virtual shareholder meeting or VSM platform. We encourage you to review these materials as they are now in effect. At our meeting this morning, we will first address the matters described in the company's notice of meeting and proxy statement dated March 26, 2026. We will then open the polls for voting, announce the results of the voting, and adjourn the formal portion of the meeting. In order to attend this meeting, you must have been a stockholder of record as of March 20, 2026. The board of directors has appointed Michael Barbera, a representative from First Coast Results, to serve as the Inspector of Election for this meeting.
The inspector is in attendance virtually and has taken his oath of office, which will be filed with the minutes of this meeting. I now call on Ms. Smith, the secretary of the company, to present the inspector's report as to stock representation.
Mr. Di Piazza and Ms. Aiyar, the inspector reports that the outstanding capital stock of the company at 5:00 P.M. Eastern Time on March 20, 2026, the record date for determination of stockholders entitled to vote at this meeting, consisted of a total of 2,506,768,389 shares of Series A common stock. 1,761,308,790 shares of Series A common stock have submitted a proxy to the company and are so represented by proxy at this meeting. This represents approximately 70.26% of the voting power of the Series A common stock, which is more than the amount necessary to constitute a quorum.
Thank you, Ms. Smith. The inspector's report will become a part of the minutes. Now that we've established that a quorum is present, the meeting is duly constituted to transact business. As stated in the notice of the meeting and the proxy statement, there are two items of business scheduled for action at this meeting in connection with the company's contemplated combination with Paramount Skydance, contemplated by the agreement and plan of merger dated February 27, 2026, as it may be amended from time to time by and among Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount Skydance, and Prince Sub, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Paramount Skydance. We will consider and vote on each of the merger proposal and the compensation proposal. No additional proposals will be considered at today's meeting. We will consider each item in turn in the same order in which it appears in the notice of the meeting.
The polls for each matter upon which shareholders or stockholders will vote at the meeting will open when such matter is called to a vote and will remain open until I announce that the polls are closed. Ms. Smith will now review the voting rules for the meeting and present each proposal for a vote.
No ballots or proxies, revocations of, or changes to ballots or proxies will be accepted after the polls are closed. Near the end of the meeting, after the tabulation of the voting, I, as the secretary, will announce the preliminary voting results on each proposal. If you have already returned a proxy either by mail, telephone, or via the internet, your vote will be counted automatically without any further action on your part. If you have not previously voted and wish to do so, or if you wish to change your earlier vote, you may do so by clicking the Vote Here button on the VSM platform. The first proposal to be voted on by the stockholders is the merger proposal. This proposal relates to adoption of the agreement and plan of merger, dated as of February 27th, 2026, by and among Warner Bros. Discovery.
Paramount Skydance, and Prince Sub, Inc., a wholly-owned merger subsidiary of Paramount Skydance. Pursuant to which, among other things, at the effective time of the merger, the merger subsidiary will merge with and into Warner Bros. Discovery, with Warner Bros. Discovery surviving as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Paramount Skydance. The Board of Directors recommends that stockholders vote for the merger proposal. We will now proceed to vote. The second and final proposal to be considered by the stockholders is an advisory, non-binding vote on the compensation proposal. This proposal relates to the compensation that may be paid or become payable to WBD's named executive officers that is based on or otherwise relates to the merger. Stockholders are being provided with the opportunity to cast an advisory vote on such payments. The Board of Directors recommends that stockholders vote for the compensation proposal. We will now proceed to vote.
In accordance with our bylaws, these are the only matters of business that will be conducted at this meeting. I now declare the polls closed, and all matters have now been voted on by our stockholders.
I will now ask Michael Barbera, the Inspector of Election, to proceed with the canvassing of the votes. Ms. Smith, will you please present to us Mr. Barbera's preliminary report on today's balloting?
Mr. Barbera has notified me that the merger proposal has received sufficient votes and has overwhelmingly passed. Mr. Barbera has also notified me that the compensation proposal did not receive sufficient votes and has not passed.
These results are preliminary until we receive a final report of the Inspector of Election. After we receive the final report, we will report the final votes on a Form 8-K to be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission within four days of this meeting. This concludes the formal business scheduled for the special meeting of our stockholders. I would like to again thank each of you for attending today's meeting. I would also like to thank our investors and our owners for their support through this entire process. Thanks to the thousands of WBD colleagues who have helped build this company and will continue to build as we proceed. To our management team, who have done an amazing job in positioning this company for success, and to our board, for their strategic leadership over the last number of years.
As chair of this meeting, I hereby declare that the special meeting of stockholders of Warner Bros. Discovery is adjourned.
Goodbye.
The meeting is now concluded. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.