“Brian Marshall of Gleacher & Co. estimates that that Cupertino-based Apple rents about 475,000 TV shows and movies daily versus Los Gatos-based Netflix’s 5.1 million rentals a day,” Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal reports. “‘What I’d like to see is Apple buying Netflix,’ [Marshall wrote in a note to clients.] ‘Netflix has approximately 150,000 titles, while Apple has just 15,000. Apple has a tremendous opportunity (if it buys Netflix).'”
Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal reports, “Including a 20 percent premium over Netflix’s current market cap, such an acquisition would cost about $12 billion.”
Full article here.
As Apple moves more Apple TV’s into homes the gap with Netflix will narrow. If Apple offered a monthly sub download service it would close very quickly.
(Translation:)Analyst: I can make a lot of money for myself and my clients in the short term if Apple buys Netflix. So, Apple, please buy Netflix.
Jay-Z is right. This has been investigated before. If Netflix is bought by anyone their contracts with the movie studios immediately become null and void.
Makes no sense to me, but for different reasons. Netflix doesn’t need Apple and vice versa. Netflix streaming is available across multiple devices including AppleTV, iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch, PS3, Wii, Roku, Xbox, PCs, Macs, plus networked HDTVs and Blu-ray players. They’re very well positioned to serve physical and streaming media across multiple platforms which is much bigger than an iTunes/iOS only distribution channel. Netflix’s biggest challenge is keeping the cost of licensing content reasonable, which is a challenge for all distributors.
I will say that an acquisition by Amazon.com of Netflix would make better sense. For physical media, Amazon would benefit from even greater economies of scale for both physical sales and rentals, plus can consolidate and leverage their respective physical distribution centers. Streaming/digital media would complement each other well since Amazon does single rentals/purchases (on release) while Netflix offers a subscription model (delayed). Their could also be some synergy between Amazon.com cloud services and Netflix’s streaming servers.
@predrag
I resent that comment about women. A lot. :/ I’m female, and I definitely am not uninformed about such things.
Apple does not need to buy these companies at all. Apple gets their nice part of the revenue and we are all happy about it.
Just got an AppleTV box. Its FULL of problems. My Roku box is much better. For example:
1. Constant HDCP errors
2. More internet content / apps available
3. Voice vs picture gets unsynced
4. Amazon Video is cheaper than Itunes
….probably more problems to come….
@ Big Als MBP
You nailed it. Netflix is only valuable if it maintains cost-effective access to content. As it currently stands, Netflix provides content to Apple users that can be streamed using the AppleTV. Apple does not need to own everything.
But NVidia is a different story, IMO, and a much better takeover target. After AMD bought ATI, NVidia is the only other major game in town and the Mac has always suffered a bit in terms of high end graphics cards and price/performance of graphics options, in general. Why not buy NVidia and throw the Apple R&D magic at it?
@Remi
You must forgive Predrag – he’s quite the ‘ye olde schoole’ type of person. But he means no harm. He’s merely commenting on his wife’s fecklessness with electronic products in general so he can be the gallant gentleman of the house showing her how things work.
I’m sure you have perfect felicity with Apple TV so Predrag’s comments are not meant for you.
No. Just no. Why would they buy it? They have iTunes. Buy it there or get over it.
Love NetFlix. Almost never rent or buy from iTunes. Not enough liner notes on the music and for shows, if it’s not on NetFlix it will be. I can wait. Why pay $5 / show when I can pay <$10 per month and stream it or have them send it to me.