PSound
05-18-09, 07:32 PM
Netflix may eventually double or quadruple its subscriber base, as the largest U.S. movie-rental service via mail expands its video-streaming service to include more content and more electronic devices that can play it, the company’s chief financial officer, Barry McCarthy, said today.
Netflix, which continues to boost the number of people who uses its DVD-by-mail service, may eventually be able to increase its number of customers to between 20 million and 40 million, McCarthy said at the J.P. Morgan Global Technology, Media and Telecom Conference in Boston on Monday. McCarthy based his estimation on the approximately 40 million people who subscribe to pay-per-view services of premium cable channels such as Time Warner’s HBO and Liberty Media’s Starz.
“How large it becomes depends on the value quality of the proposition,” said McCarthy, adding that Netflix’s DVD subscription with video-streaming at no extra cost makes consumers feel “as if we lowered the price of subscriptions.”
While increasing its investment in its video-streaming product, Netflix has maintained that the number of subscribers for its DVD-delivery service won’t peak until between 2013 and 2018. The company last month said its first-quarter net income jumped 68% after it expanded its subscriber base by 25% from a year earlier to 10.31 million.
Still, the company is looking to attract more video-streaming customers by broadening its content beyond its 12,000-plus digital titles. Netflix, which last October reached an agreement to stream from the 2,500 titles in the “Starz Play” broadband-subscription service, is looking to further boost its digital inventory by reaching agreements with such distributors as the Epix Channel, which Viacom, MGM and Lionsgate are set to launch later this year, McCarthy said.
“I’m confident that there’ll be a number of announcements between now and year-end on the content front,” said McCarthy, adding that the company would be “delighted” to license content from Epix.
http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6659176.html
Netflix, which continues to boost the number of people who uses its DVD-by-mail service, may eventually be able to increase its number of customers to between 20 million and 40 million, McCarthy said at the J.P. Morgan Global Technology, Media and Telecom Conference in Boston on Monday. McCarthy based his estimation on the approximately 40 million people who subscribe to pay-per-view services of premium cable channels such as Time Warner’s HBO and Liberty Media’s Starz.
“How large it becomes depends on the value quality of the proposition,” said McCarthy, adding that Netflix’s DVD subscription with video-streaming at no extra cost makes consumers feel “as if we lowered the price of subscriptions.”
While increasing its investment in its video-streaming product, Netflix has maintained that the number of subscribers for its DVD-delivery service won’t peak until between 2013 and 2018. The company last month said its first-quarter net income jumped 68% after it expanded its subscriber base by 25% from a year earlier to 10.31 million.
Still, the company is looking to attract more video-streaming customers by broadening its content beyond its 12,000-plus digital titles. Netflix, which last October reached an agreement to stream from the 2,500 titles in the “Starz Play” broadband-subscription service, is looking to further boost its digital inventory by reaching agreements with such distributors as the Epix Channel, which Viacom, MGM and Lionsgate are set to launch later this year, McCarthy said.
“I’m confident that there’ll be a number of announcements between now and year-end on the content front,” said McCarthy, adding that the company would be “delighted” to license content from Epix.
http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6659176.html