It’s a streaming world, and we just live in it.
With a majority of the world’s cinemas closed due to Covid, and Hollywood studios inventing new distribution models, Netflix is already experiencing the roaring 20’s with nearly 204 million subscribers taking over the service worldwide and the company’s market capitalization against $ 221.7 billion. Netflix has announced that it will debut 70 films during 2021 (the top 5 studios in the pre-pandemic era could release as many as 90 theatrical titles together), and it looks like we’ll all be staying home for a while while we wait incoming President Joe Biden’s 100 million vaccines in its first 100 days to take effect.
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As Netflix has already entered into an agreement with Cinemark to show their films in a shortened window – unthinkable for a large chain to agree to before the pandemic – Ted Sarandos, co-CEO and chief content officer, was asked by Kannan Venkateshwar , Barclays media analyst, during the streamer. Q4 earnings video as a new revenue stream was available at the box office (the implication was that AMC and Regal would agree to play Netflix rates in a shortened window).
“Potentially,” Sarandos replied.
‘We never had a problem with movies going to theaters, it was that you had to commit to this very long window of exclusivity to gain access to theaters. That was the biggest challenge. So if these windows are going to collapse, and we have easier access to show our movies in theaters, I would like consumers to be able to make the choice to be outside or see it at home, which became the norm during Covid. , ”Sarandos explained.
Reed Hastings, founder and co-CEO, rather gave mud to the WarnerMedia streaming service HBO Max, and it sounded like a thumbs up to his rival’s distribution plan for movies in theaters and on HBO Max simultaneously day-and-date during 2021 to issue. But with an asterisk.
‘Hopefully, with the kind of Covid move from Warner Bros., we’ll, like the second half of the year, see the Covid that people go to the theaters in large numbers and watch their movies and at the same time the premiere on HBO Max, and it will really determine a path for simultaneously; it is good for film, helps both online and streaming and also in theaters. But we have to wait for Covid to read it carefully, ”Hastings said.
Regarding Netflix, a PVOD outlet for studios that want to release their films on a premium basis, Sarandos said: “We’re not saying it’s not an (attractive model), but this one was the most attractive model, both for consumers and our own business ”about the stream’s one-price, ad-free, all-you-can-consume model.
He added that Netflix has managed to swing into what they program, i.e. a foreign series like Lupien, as consumers open their minds to content, especially those who have avoided the subtitle series. In essence, consumers’ dollars are not at risk, as it is by title in the cinema, so it is risk-free for them to try.
Venkateshwar also asked Sarandos if the big plan of 70 movies from the jet this year would lead them to a low financial return in the future.
Without getting Granandos, he replied: “If you think about a handful of titles that end up making a huge return for the studio, as opposed to the hundreds of titles that barely transgress, it’s an excellent model for producers to get into. And the fact that we can support it day-in and day-out with this kind of volume and make projects that would otherwise be quite difficult to make in some cases was very encouraging for filmmakers to accept this kind of model. ”