Utah is often called the Silicon Slopes, and for good reason. Our state has become home to entrepreneurs and cutting-edge technology companies drawn by a competitive tax climate, a skilled workforce and a business environment far more welcoming than that in places like California. This didn’t happen by accident, as Utah invested millions to attract companies. Today, over 118,000 Utah residents work for the tech industry, which generates over $122 billion in annual economic activity for the state.
That success is precisely why the proposed merger between Netflix and Warner Bros. Discovery should give Utahns pause.
This deal could threaten the vitality of Utah’s competitive, locally grounded and economically diverse creative economy. Utah Sen. Mike Lee, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee’s antitrust subcommittee, reacted quickly, warning this merger should “send alarm to antitrust enforcers.”
The state should commend Sen. Lee for promising to examine the merger through a series of congressional reviews and hearings. We have quickly become a major center for film, digital media and creative production and can’t afford to watch this progress slip through our fingers.
Angel Studios in Utah is symbolic of this success. The quickly growing company produces family- and faith-focused content for a global streaming audience.
These productions don’t just benefit studios. They create jobs for caterers, carpenters, electricians, hotel workers, set designers and digital artists, many of whom comprise the backbone of Utah’s small-business-centered economy.
The central concern with the Netflix–Warner Bros. Discovery merger is the concentration of power. The deal would unite the world’s largest streaming distributor with one of the most storied and content-rich studios. If approved, the combined company would control more than one-third of all streaming activity. This would give it enormous leverage over content creators, producers and independent studios.
For Utah, that would likely mean fewer buyers for locally produced content and fewer opportunities for its independent projects to find an audience. Creative freedom suffers when a single gatekeeper dominates the market.
There is also a cultural risk. Netflix’s business model relies heavily on predictive algorithms designed to maximize global scale and minimize risk. Imposing that model on Warner Bros. Discovery’s prestige brands, especially HBO, would likely squeeze out the very kinds of midbudget, creatively ambitious and regionally specific projects that bring production dollars into Utah. These are the projects most vulnerable when media power is centralized.
Film and digital media are powerful economic multipliers for the state. Every production dollar spent ripples through Utah’s service, hospitality and construction sectors. We can’t afford for the industry to breed a walking antitrust violation within its midst that is able to dictate terms, reduce licensing fees and cut production spending in ways that directly harm our state’s economy.
Sen. Lee is right — a single, all-powerful streaming giant would be too dominant and too damaging to the competitive ecosystem that has fueled Silicon Slopes, supported our creative workforce and turned Utah’s landscapes into engines of economic growth.
This megamerger deserves serious scrutiny, and Utah has every reason to oppose it.