Paramount Global is letting go of about 800 staffers days after the company’s coverage of the Super Bowl set a record for the most-watched program in U.S. television history, according to people familiar with the matter.
The company is eliminating roughly 800 jobs, or about 3% of its workforce, according to a person familiar with the situation, who asked not to be identified because the information isn’t public. The owner of CBS, Nickelodeon and other channels is trying to boost profits at a time when viewers are canceling cable and satellite TV packages in favor of streaming services like Netflix.
Paramount+, the company’s own online TV service, is not profitable. Attendance at movie theaters has not recovered to prepandemic levels, putting pressure on the company’s namesake film studio as well. Shares were down 4% to $12.87 at 10:11 a.m. in New York. They’ve declined 13% this year.