Judge says he'll rule Thursday on CBS attempt to escape National Amusements
A Delaware judge overseeing the audacious CBS effort to extract itself from its controlling shareholder, National Amusements, said he would rule Thursday on the case.
Andre Bouchard, chancellor of the Delaware Court of Chancery, said Wednesday that the unusual case had surprised him.
“I’ve never seen anything like what’s transpired here in terms of moving parts,” he said according to an article in the Hollywood Reporter.
The judge said he would rule ahead of a planned CBS board meeting on Thursday and in the meantime granted CBS a request for a temporary restraining order against the Redstone family’s National Amusements, which owns a majority of the voting power in CBS.
CBS surprised National Amusements on Monday with a request for a restraining order and an announcement that the company would seek to dilute the Redstone family’s controlling stake in the company.
In a counteraction on Wednesday, National Amusements changed CBS bylaws to require that 90 percent of directors must vote in order to pass CBS’s planned changes at tomorrow’s meeting. The move effectively blocks CBS's effort to become an independent company. National Amusement’s president, Shari Redstone, is a CBS board member as is her family lawyer, Robert Klieger.
According to Hollywood Reporter, Meredith Kotler, an attorney for National Amusements, said: “My client has a right to get in front of the train and prevent what’s happened. It was an ambush.”
The case has gripped the media and advertising world since the legal battle could result in two possible outcomes: the exit of CBS chief executive, Leslie Moonves, or the dilution of National Amusements' control of the voting shares in the company. That could have wider ramifications for other family-owned companies.
The timing of the case has largely overshadowed CBS efforts to draw media attention to its slate of new shows. Advertisers from around the country gathered on Wednesday afternoon to see the network's upfront show. They are expected to commit billions of ad dollars to the schedule without quite knowing whether Moonves, a legendary programming executive, will be in place.
Moonves appeared at the CBS upfront to applause from the crowd. He had been absent from the programming press conference earlier on Wednesday. Meanwhile, CBS late night host Stephen Colbert made fun of the legal drama from the presentation.