Netflix CEO and Co-Founder Reed Hastings doesn’t care whether you are watching reruns of an old favorite too many times to count or experiencing a Netflix Original for the first time. He knows people are subscribing to the streaming service in record numbers. Netflix recently announced 26 million new subscribers in the first half of 2020, giving the company approximately 193 million subscribers in total.
“Consumers don’t really care how we do it,” Reed said in an interview with Yahoo! Finance. “What they care (about) is that we have some of the best series and the best films that anyone’s ever produced. We care really about what are the options that we have for consumers, rather than how and who produces it.”
Hastings and Netflix have put their money where their mouth is, shelling out 15 billion dollars on content in 2019, putting the company on par with other industry leaders Viacom/CBS and just behind Comcast at 15.4 billion. Disney leads the way, spending 27.8 billion dollars on content.
Netflix plans to reach deeper in their pockets this year as they will spend an estimated 17.3 billion with a large portion of those funds earmarked for original content, according to BMO Capital Markets analyst Dan Salmon.
Some of the most anticipated original programming will feature Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, and his wife, American actress Meghan Markle, after the couple recently cut ties with the Royal Family. Other original shows that have created industry buzz are Enola Holmes, staring Mille Bobbie Brown (who rose to stardom in the Netflix Original Stanger Things) and Challenger: Final Flight, a documentary which examines the events surrounding the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger.
Some other original programming such as Cuties has been widely met with criticism due to perceived sexualization of children. It has caused the hashtag #CancelNetflix to trend on Twitter in recent days. But Hastings doesn’t seem to mind the controversy or the fact that he is being out-spent by other companies.
“They’re doing a lot of things that are interesting, but we’re focused on being a great entertainment company,” Hastings said. “We’re never going to be all of entertainment. Other people are going to do other shows.”
Story written by BNM contributor Jacob Conley. Follow him on Twitter @GWUJake.
