[4] It was founded on December 15, 2015, by Xavier Niel, Matthieu Pigasse and Pierre-Antoine Capton under the legal form of a special-purpose acquisition company ("SPAC") with the purpose to acquire assets and operations in the media production and distribution business in Europe.

[14] In June 2017, Mediawan announced exclusive talks to acquire a majority stake in Paris-based French documentary production company Clarke Costelle & Co. (CC&C) [15] One month later in July of that same year, Mediawan announced that they had completed their acquisition of a majority stake in Paris-based French documentary audiovisual production company Clarke Costelle & Co (CC&C).

Also in the same month, they announced that they purchased the remaining 35% stake in Luxembourgish television channel RTL9 from its previous parent company RTL Group.

[28] In April 2019 one year after Mediawan brought ON Entertainment, Mediawan announced that they had established a partnership with world-known French author and illustrator Joann Sfar to adapt his works into film and television with the acquisition of a majority stake in Joann Sfar's animation production company Nice Pictures and placed it under ON Kids & Family.

[34] In June 2020, Mediawan announced that their children's subsidiary ON Kids & Family had rebranded their Joann Sfar's Paris-based production company Nice Pictures as their mini-studio and renamed it to Magical Society with Veteran animation producer and founder of Method Animation and producer Aton Soumache and award-winning publisher Joann Sfar heading the rebranded company.

[35] On 22 June 2020, Mediawan announced the creation of a dedicated pan-European company named Mediawan Alliance with them announcing that they had established an agreement to acquire a minority stake in German film and television production and distribution company Leonine Holding and announced that they had entered negotiations to buy French entertainment production and distribution company Lagardère Studios and their production subsidiaries including its distribution division from the Lagardère Group for €100 million that could further expand Mediawan's production portfolio and further expand Mediawan's international operations into other countries like Spain in order for Lagardère to focus on its publishing and travel retail operations.

Mediawan also announced that they brought a majority stake in Spanish-based content production company Good Mood expanding their Spanish operations.

[46] In January 2022, Mediawan under their joint venture division Mediawan & Leonine Studios announced that they had opened up an American office based in Los Angeles, California and had hired former Red Arrow Studios and Fremantle executive Caroline Kusser to handle the joint venture division's own international co-productions as their executive VP.

[55] On 30 October 2022, Mediawan announced that they were in exclusive talks to acquiring in a significant stake Brad Pitt's American film and television production studio Plan B Entertainment.

[68] Later in that same month, Mediawan which already held a 25% minority stake in Munich-based German film & television production and distribution company Leonine Holding since 2020 announced that they had entered an agreement to acquire the remaining stakes of Munich-based German film and television production and distribution company Leonine Holding and their production companies which was also owned by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts by acquiring the remaining stakes in an all stock deal.

[76][77] In September 2024, Mediawan announced that they had signed a global content production partnership with professional basketball player LeBron James and Maverick Carter's American entertainment production company SpringHill Company to produce and develop film and television series and adapt existing IP together along with explore international distribution opportunities starting with Weekend Warriors.