Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine Exploring Possible Sale, Price Could Hit $1 Billion

Brent Lang
·2 min read
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Hello Sunshine, the media company founded by Oscar-winner Reese Witherspoon, is pursuing a possible sale, Variety has confirmed. The price for the company behind “Big Little Lies” and “The Morning Show” could hit $1 billion. That’s an impressive figure given that Hello Sunshine has created some buzzy shows, but is still a relatively new player in the space with a slender library of past hits.

It’s also a sign that streamers and media companies are desperate to bolster their arsenals of original content as new services like HBO Max, Paramount Plus, Peacock and Disney Plus vie for dominance against established players such as Netflix. It’s a race for buzzy shows and movies that’s led Amazon to shell out $8.45 billion for the rights to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and has resulted in the pending merger of WarnerMedia and Discovery.

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The Wall Street Journal broke the news of a potential sale. Apple, where Witherspoon’s “The Morning Show” appears, was one of the companies that had reportedly expressed interest in buying Hello Sunshine, according to the paper.

Hello Sunshine has enlisted financial advisers to help it explore a possible sale, but it was not immediately clear how much progress had been made or if one suitor was in the lead to land the company.

In addition to Witherspoon, the company’s leaders include Seth Rodsky and her husband, the former CAA agent Jim Toth. Equity investors include AT&T’s Otter Media and Laurene Powell Jobs’s Emerson Collective.

Hello Sunshine has shows set up at several players, including Apple TV Plus, Hulu, Amazon Prime and Netflix. It has also moved beyond shows and films to launch a book club and a female-centric podcasting network.

Spokespeople for Hello Sunshine and Apple declined to comment.

Elaine Low contributed to this report.

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