The Walt Disney Company has taken a strong stance on streaming.
The price of ad-free Disney+ will soon increase to $13.99 per month — a 27% increase from the current price. Additionally, Disney started offering fresh Disney/Hulu bundles to bring in new customers. But could this latest move further cement Disney’s commitment to streaming? Let’s take a look.
Disney CEO Bob Iger previously shared that he wants to integrate Hulu into Disney’s streaming business. While Iger has waffled on the idea of owning 100% of Hulu over the past few months, it seems a deal with Comcast (who owns one-third of Hulu) may be happening soon.
Recently, Comcast and Disney signed off on a modification to their original agreement to speed up the discussion of Disney acquiring Comcast’s stake in Hulu. The date was changed to September 30th, according to Variety.
Comcast CEO Brian Roberts estimated that “All the synergies around Hulu could be worth $30 billion, before you even ascribe value to Hulu itself,” per Variety. Roberts also revealed that Goldman Sachs was brought into the appraisal process, noting that the process may take some time.
The Walt Disney Company owns 67% of Hulu, while NBCUniversal (Comcast) owns the remaining 33%. The question of whether Disney would acquire the rest of Hulu or sell has been analyzed for quite some time now. In some earlier interviews, Iger has been less than optimistic about the idea.
Back in February, Iger said, “Everything is on the table right now, so I am not going to speculate whether we are a buyer or a seller of it. But I obviously have suggested that I’m concerned about undifferentiated general entertainment, particularly in the competitive landscape that we are operating in, and we are going to look at it very objectively and expansively,” according to Deadline.
Then, in a later CNBC interview with David Faber, Iger changed his stance. In discussing the possibility of buying Hulu, he explained, “I spent a lot of time looking at that as part of the future of our streaming business, and ultimately concluded that we would be better off having Hulu than not having Hulu.”
He went on to say, “Hulu is a diversified business in terms of its content offering. It’s done extremely well on the advertising front. It will help in terms of viewer engagement and advertising, meaning the combined app. And it’s the right thing for us to do as we prioritize turning that business not just into a profitable business but a growth business, which I’m confident we can do.”
Former CEO Bob Chapek Lived in “Unrelenting Fear” of Iger While at Disney
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What do you think about this deal? Let us know in the comments!
you can bet head clown iger at the disney circus will pay a lot of money for something that he will ruin and render worthless — just like he did with star wars, marvel, pixar and indiana jones.