Elon Musk Invests a Billion Dollars Into the Company That Owns CNN, making him a part-owner
Tech entrepreneur deepens his stake in a debt-heavy Hollywood giant that now controls major news networks
Elon Musk has put roughly one billion dollars into Skydance, the media company that now owns CNN, CBS, HBO, Warner Bros., and Paramount+. The news broke on October 22, 2026, when Semafor reported the investment, citing people familiar with the deal. Other outlets quickly confirmed the same basic facts.
Skydance finished its takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery earlier this month in a deal valued around $110 billion. That merger created one of the largest entertainment companies in the country and left it carrying close to $80 billion in debt. Company leaders have said they plan to cut about $6 billion in costs over the next three years. Musk’s money arrived around the same time as other equity investments, including one from Laurene Powell Jobs, the widow of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs.
The move continues a long relationship between Musk and the Ellison family. Larry Ellison, the Oracle founder and father of Skydance co-CEO David Ellison, put about one billion dollars behind Musk’s purchase of Twitter in 2022. Ellison has also invested in Tesla in the past. Cable executive John Malone recently predicted that Musk and the Ellisons would do more business together because of those ties.
For people who already worry about the power of big tech companies, the investment raises straightforward questions. Musk already controls X, Tesla, SpaceX, and other major platforms. Now he holds a piece of a company that runs two of the country’s best-known television news networks along with major film and streaming businesses. Reports do not say how large his ownership stake is or whether he will get a board seat or any formal say in operations. Even a minority stake in a company this size means one person with deep pockets and strong political views has a financial interest in what CNN and CBS put on the air.
Critics of concentrated media power have long argued that a handful of large companies already decide much of what Americans see and hear. Adding a major technology investor who has been open about his disagreements with traditional news outlets does not reduce that concentration. It simply adds another large player with his own interests and his own record of public disputes with the press.
Skydance’s leaders say they want to run the company with more technology tools and tighter budgets. Whether Musk’s money changes how the news divisions operate, or whether it mainly helps pay down debt, will become clearer over the next several months. For now, the public knows that one of the country’s largest technology executives has written a billion-dollar check to the parent company of CNN.
Sources / More reading
- Semafor: https://www.semafor.com/article/10/22/2026/elon-musk-makes-1-billion-investment-in-ellisons-skydance
- CNBC: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/10/22/elon-musk-skydance-investment.html
- New York Post: https://nypost.com/2026/10/22/business/elon-musk-invests-1b-in-david-ellisons-skydance-as-media-giant-grapples-with-massive-debt-report/
- Bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-10-22/musk-has-invested-1-billion-in-skydance-semafor-reports
- TechCrunch: https://techcrunch.com/2026/10/22/elon-musk-made-a-1-billion-investment-in-skydance-report-says/
- The Wrap: https://www.thewrap.com/industry-news/tech/elon-musk-skydance-1-billion-investment/
- Yahoo Finance: https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-invests-1bn-cnn-193546831.html