THE NETFLIX SUCCESS story continues apace with the news that the streaming service is set to ramp up its international expansion in the immediate future.
The company, whose branch out into original programming has been an unqualified success, announced spectacular final quarter results for 2014 today.
Netflix is well-established in Ireland having first launched here in 2012, though the depth of programming available on these shores still lags significantly behind what’s on offer in the US.
All told the company added 13 million worldwide subscribers last year, and it expects to pass 61 million paying customers by the end of March.
With earnings also hitting a new high of $83.4 million for the quarter, CEO Reed Hastings announced that the service plans to complete its international expansion by 2017.
“It’s going to be an exciting couple of years,” Hastings told the gathered media.
This expansion is the next logical step for Netflix – as subscribers have maxed out in America the profit avalanche currently being seen is fired fundamentally by the company’s newer overseas markets.
With the success of its own-brand programming the company, based in Los Gatos California, plans to borrow $1 billion to help finance its big international push, and an entry into China may even be on the cards.
“Internet TV is growing globally, and Netflix is leading the charge,” said a letter to shareholders accompanying today’s results.
New Zealand and Australia are next on the agenda and should have a Netflix service by March, while the service is increasing spending on its its own shows in the face of intense competition from the likes of Amazon, HBO and US streaming service Hulu.
Hastings’ company plans on making 320 hours of new and original content this year, including Breaking Bad methadone Better Call Saul, season three of House of Cards, and the new Tina Fey comedy The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.
You can also expect to see The Interview on Netflix in the near future, the controversial James Franco comedy whose very existence lead to threats from North Korea and the hacking of Sony Pictures’ email servers.
We might watch that one in incognito mode so.
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