What does Hulu’s future hold now that Disney owns all of it?
What does Hulu’s future hold now that Disney owns all of it?
Disney has multiple options for Hulu now that it owns Hulu outright.
It’s a done deal. After years of negotiations, evaluations from arbitrators, and a few public shots across each other’s bows, Disney has finally completed its buyout of Comcast’s 33% stake in Hulu. The process was an arduous one, but now that it’s over, Disney will be able to fully take control of Hulu’s future. What will that mean? We don’t exactly know quite yet, but I’ve got a few ideas about what could be coming in the future for one streaming’s original services.
Key Details:
- Not for sale: Disney could sell Hulu if it wants to, but that seems highly unlikely.
- Come together: An integration with Disney+ seems likely.
- What about live TV?: An integration of Hulu + Live TV with Fubo could help Disney further cut costs.
It’s a new day at Disney; now that Hulu is completely owned by the House of Mouse, it can finally move forward with whatever CEO Bob Iger and company have planned for the streamer. There’s no shortage of options, but some of them seem a little more realistic than others to an analyst who has been following the story for years. Iger said in an appearance on CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street” on Tuesday that the company is now “focused on doing what we intended to do once we gain full control of this.”
Now that Disney owns Hulu outright, it could sell the streamer to another media company if it really wanted, but I don’t foresee that as a real possibility. Disney didn’t go through all the trouble of buying out Hulu just to turn around and flip it, and the Hulu brand can be quite valuable for the company.
I think the most realistic possibility is that Hulu will decide to fold all of its content into the Disney+ platform, creating a one-stop-shop super app. Recent moves from the company appear to have been laying the groundwork for that possibility. It would make Disney+ the company’s only entertainment streaming app, instead of forcing customers to navigate multiple apps to get to all content under the Disney umbrella. Much of Hulu’s on-demand content is already available on Disney+, so integrating the rest would allow Disney to remove redundancies and save money by shutting down Hulu.
Comments from Iger indicate that such a course of action could indeed be in Hulu’s future.
“[The plan is] basically to put these apps together seamlessly, to create an experience for the consumer that’s easier to use, easier to buy, to increase engagement, to lower churn, to grow subs, and ultimately to consolidate more and to save some money in terms of the operation,” he said.
Even if many analysts believe this to be the endgame, I do think that Disney will keep the streamer’s branding intact; Hulu is one of the oldest streaming services in the world, first launching in 2007, and because of its high-quality originals and next-day streaming of broadcast and cable shows, has built a following and a reputation for a different type of entertainment than Disney+ is known for. It would make sense to maintain the name Hulu to help users differentiate the types of titles they can find on the Disney+ app.
This idea gains more merit when considering that ESPN is set to launch an all-encompassing streaming service this fall as well. Disney could put all its entertainment and sports on the Disney+ app by making more ESPN content available there too; like Hulu, a selection of ESPN+ content is already found on Disney+. Making all content from Hulu and ESPN watchable on Disney+ would create a streaming service that just might be able to compete with Netflix globally.
This would likely require multiple subscriptions, but with the enduring popularity of the Disney Bundle, it could be a way to streamline streaming options while further ingratiating the offerings into the viewing habits of subscribers.
Another big question is what will happen with Hulu + Live TV, the live TV streaming service that comes with 90+ channels in its base package. That streamer is due to acquire the sports-focused platform Fubo in a deal that will see Disney take over 70% of the resulting company. When initially announced, the plan was to keep the two streamers separate, with the current Fubo team continuing to run the streamer. However, having two such similar services under the same corporate hierarchy will create another set of redundancy that Disney could eliminate in order to save money.
It’s true that Fubo offers more sports options than Hulu + Live TV, including regional sports networks in most markets. But it could make a lot of sense for Disney to discontinue Hulu + Live TV, and move forward with Fubo as its sole live TV streaming option. It could keep offering a channel package with all of the channel options that Hulu + Live TV currently offers as another tier inside of Fubo.
If that does happen, it will inevitably lead to other questions. Would Fubo co-founder and CEO David Gandler stay on indefinitely to run the operation? Gandler will stay with Hulu after the merger, but how long Disney will be obligated to keep him and his team is unknown.
In my view, however, Disney might be better off keeping Fubo as a separate brand. It’s a name that’s synonymous with sports coverage, and viewers are used to finding channels there that they don’t see on many other live TV services. I think Hulu + Live TV and Fubo have different enough audiences that keeping the brands apart is a good idea, at least for now.
There are plenty of options for Disney to consider now that it owns Hulu outright. I still think an eventual full integration with Disney+ is the most likely outcome, but the ultimate decision belongs to Iger and his lieutenants. Changes are undoubtedly on the way for Hulu, we’ll just have to wait and see which ones.
This article was updated to include quotes from Disney CEO Bob Iger.
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