“We don’t believe this consolidation has affected our growth much, if at all,” Netflix said, adding that it doesn’t see the need to pursue similarly large acquisitions to stay competitive.
Disney+ more than doubled its share of demand interest in the second quarter compared with a year earlier, and Amazon Prime Video, AppleTV+ and HBO Max are also gaining, according to Parrot.
Even as newer entrants have chipped away at Netflix’s long-held grip, the company has downplayed competition concerns. In its letter to shareholders, it said the industry overall was “still very much in the early days” of the transition from traditional pay television to streaming.
“We are confident that we have a long runway for growth,” Netflix said. “As we improve our service, our goal is to continue to increase our share of screen time in the U.S. and around the world.”
In April, Reed Hastings, Netflix’s co-chief executive, dismissed the competition as pretenders to the Netflix throne. When investors asked him why the company had missed its expectations for adding new customers in the first quarter, he said, “Of course we’re wondering, ‘Well, wait a second, are we sure it’s not competition?’”
“We really looked through all the data, looking at different regions where new competitors are launched, are not launched,” he continued. “And we just can’t see any difference in our relative growth in those regions, which is what gives us confidence.”
“We’ve been competing with Amazon Prime for 13 years, with Hulu for 14 years,” he added. “It’s always been very competitive with linear TV, too. So there’s no real change that we can detect in the competitive environment. It’s always been high and remains high.”
