HBO Max and Paramount+ are headed toward becoming one streaming service, but not right away. "Long-term, the plan is basically to bring them together," Paramount chief David Ellison said, according to Deadline.

In the short term, the two apps will stay separate, and the company will start by bundling them, Deadline reported. Ellison told investors in March that the services would be combined, The Hollywood Reporter said.

Ellison said technology will speed up the work. Paramount has already merged the tech behind Paramount+, BET+ and Pluto TV, Deadline said. Its sources expect the tech consolidation for HBO Max to finish within a year. Ellison also said AI will help speed the combination, The Hollywood Reporter reported. Together, the services count more than 200 million subscribers worldwide.

Not everyone has pushed for a full merger. HBO content chief Casey Bloys, speaking at a Bloomberg event, pointed to the HBO Max and Disney+ bundle as a model, The Hollywood Reporter said. Deadline noted Bloys has favored bundling.

The streaming plan comes as Ellison takes charge of a much larger company after the Warner Bros. Discovery merger. At a staff town hall moderated by CNN's Anderson Cooper, Ellison said the company carries about $80 billion in debt and is targeting $6 billion in cost cuts, Deadline reported. He said that "will require difficult decisions," but gave no layoff numbers. He also pledged that CNN will stay independent.

The brand has already been through changes. HBO Max was renamed Max and later switched back to HBO Max.

What we know: Ellison wants to combine HBO Max and Paramount+ eventually, starting with a bundle.

What we don't: When a single combined app would launch or what it would be called.