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The more Comcast’s Brian Roberts and Disney’s Bob Iger duel over Rupert Murdoch’s Fox media empire, the better it could be for Netflix’s Reed Hastings.
Disney is launching a family-friendly Netflix rival next year. It also had been planning to use the content it was going to buy from 21st Century Fox, like its movies and TV shows, to fortify another streaming competitor, Hulu, which it partly owns.
Comcast offered $65 billion in cash for Fox Wednesday, topping Disney’s earlier $52 billion stock offer. Disney will likely counter, which could start a bidding war.
The best outcome for Netflix would be some sort of split of Fox’s assets that sees its TV and film businesses, along with its 30% stake in Hulu, and its 39% share of European TV provider Sky fall into different hands.
If Disney wins all, it would control about 40% of the box office, more than a dozen of the top US TV networks, and Hulu, one of Netflix’s top US rivals. That’s a lot of content it could withhold from Netflix and use to prop up its competitors.
Meanwhile, Comcast’s entertainment arm, NBCUniversal, had been in early talks to start a streaming service with Warner Bros.—also soon to be owned by AT&T. That may not happen if Comcast buys Fox.
Some analysts are skeptical that either Disney or Comcast would be willing to budge on their proposals. Either way, Netflix’s Hastings will certainly be watching from the stands to see which media giant loses first blood. —Ashley Rodriguez
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