New James Bond movie sparks bidding war among five studios

Sony Pictures, Warner Brothers and 20th Century Fox are among the Hollywood studio giants fighting for the rights to distribute 'Bond 25'.
According to New York Times, Universal Pictures and Annapurna are also fighting for the rights to distribute the next James Bond movie.
The rights to 007 films are actually owned by EON and MGM, but they only produce the movies and need a distributor to handle the marketing.
Sony was picked for the job starting with "Casino Royale" in 2006 and continued until 2015 with "Spectre".
"Under its previous agreement, Sony paid 50 percent of the production costs for 'Spectre' - which totalled some USD 250 million after accounting for government incentives - but only received 25 percent of certain profits, once costs were recouped," a report said.

"Sony also shouldered tens of millions of dollars in marketing and had to give MGM a piece of the profit from non- Bond films Sony had in its own pipeline, including '22 Jump Street'."
Now, MGM and EON are allegedly offering a one-film contract only.
"MGM, which is owned by private equity firms, including Anchorage Capital Partners, probably wants to keep its options open as it considers a sale or public offering," the report added.