Written by Kianna Best on Apr 21, 2024. Posted in General Interest

Netflix witnesses fortuitous first quarter

Getting off to a good start this year, Netflix have reported a net income jump of USD 2.3 billion, beating expectations. In addition to this profit surge, the streaming platform have added 9.3 million subscribers. New releases such as The Gentleman, Baby Reindeer and their investment into the coverage of WWE tournaments, along with the surprisingly successful ad based tier service on offer, have all contributed to Netflix’s early 2024 success.

Image courtesy of Christopher Rafael/ Netflix

Whilst Netflix announced on Wednesday that they would stop reporting on they paying subscriber count from 2025, the streaming platform have shared their Q1 figures, highlighting an addition of 9.3 million subscribers to their service. This brings in a total of 269.6 million worldwide. In addition to this, the streamer announced a revenue generation of USD 9.4 billion during the first three months of the year, marking a rise of an impressive 15%. Over the same period, net income rose by 79% to USD 2.3 billion.

The company stated in a letter to their shareholders: “To sustain healthy growth long term, we must continue to improve the variety and quality of our entertainment — with more, great TV shows and movies, a stronger slate of games and must-watch live programming, innovate in our product and marketing — so fans can more easily discover, immerse themselves in and talk about the stories they love, fueling fandom and the Netflix Effect, and tap into additional revenue and profit pools — in particular scaling ads to become a more meaningful contributor to our business in ‘25 and beyond.We have built a hard to replicate combination of a strong slate, superior recommendations, broad reach and intense fandom, which drives healthy engagement on Netflix. Improvement in these key areas is the best way to delight our members and continue to grow our business.”

Since introducing their ad based membership, Netflix have seen growth year after year, recording a membership increase of 65% quarter on quarter. This strategy is just one amongst the many that the streamer has focused on in its efforts to move away from targeting subscriber growth towards prioritising profit. Other methods include price hikes and a crackdown on password sharing. Whilst stock value dropped by 4% for the company, Netflix have shown no signs of slowing down, expanding their reach with their entry into live sports, including  a partnership with WWE and their involvement with video gaming.

“We’re in the very early days of developing our live programming and I would look at this as an expansion of the types of content we offer, the way we expanded to film and unscripted and animation and most recently games,” said co-CEO Ted Sarandos . “We believe that these kind of event cultural moments like the Jake Paul and Mike Tyson fight are just that kind of television, and we want to be part of winning over those moments with our members as well, so that for me is the excitement part of this.