Netflix CFO David Wells: We'll Introduce Multi-Stream Plan Later This Year

Netflix CFO David Wells, speaking at the 40th Annual J.P. Morgan Global Technology, Media & Telecom Conference, said that Netflix will offer a multi-stream plan later this year. While the majority of Netflix streaming occurs on a home television, Wells said they are seeing more streaming on iPads, tablets and in other rooms of a household. While Netflix knows when you're watching as opposed to your spouse or kids, when Netflix personalizes the experience and and offers mutliple streams, "...you could see a family-level household membership."

Wells said that a DVR full of Sponge Bob is more of a threat to Nickelodeon, and it doesn't come with Netflix's revenue model.  

Regarding Qwikster, Wells said that the "..the brand hit will take years to recover from, with the bulk of the recovery coming in the first year." He noted that about one-third of all signups are people coming back to the service.

A recording of the talk is available on the Netflix investor website.

Thanks to FearNo1 for sending this in, also via Home Media Magazine.

Comments

[Bob Emmerich]

Will the multi-stream plan come with multi-queue support? And if they can justify 3 plans - DVD, stream and multi stream how long before the have a + tier like Hulu?

[CordCutter]

I think if they're were gonna jump into that pool Bob they would have when Starz wanted it.

I would assume each stream account would have it's own queue otherwise it would be worthless to the majority of folks. I think $2 is a good price point for each additional stream, any more than that is too much. NF recognizes though some people pay the $8 extra and just set up a secondary account under another email for their kids, so I'm not so sure they are willing to cut some folks bills by $6 a month.

[gir]

I see another big blunder coming. I can't quite foresee what it'll be - maybe tying profiles to streams so you have to pay for profiles even if you don't want multiple streams - but I'm sure it will go over like an osmium balloon.

[www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1615516630]

No need for another queue.

I have multiple computers around the house and it can be aggravating if the kids watched something on the xbox and the teen watched something from her pc and I am locked out on the main floor.

Sometimes all I need is an additional stream

[Nick]

I don't want more streams. I want more queues. Our household might be odd in that we only have way to watch Netflix (on the single TV) but it does get annoying having to scroll through a bunch of kid shows that have been thrown on the queue to find the titles I've added to the queue for me.

[Groggie]

They have profiles now, and they already have a queue, so I would assume that they wouldn't remove the queue from the profile accounts. Although the current queue is for DVD, but yeah, if they added streaming profiles, I would assume that it would have an instant queue like the dvd profile accounts have.

[Matt]

At least they telling us before they applied it. I still need more info on how it is going to work.

[isatellitelink]

Very interesting!
iSatelliteLink

[GeeEmm]

Currently, two active streaming devices are allowed to be concurrently in use on a single account, even though there is a single queue. Does that not qualify as a multi-stream? When NF talks of multi-streams, is it really talking about multi-queues, with one stream per queue? Will there still be an automatic allowance of two streams per account at the current price, or will an additional premium have to be paid? If it was just a buck or two per additional stream (up to a pre-determined limit per account, I would assume) that would be reasonable, anything over that, as CordCutter mentioned, would be too much.

[.]

isatellitelink is a f'ing spammer!