Your Urgent Questions About Disneys Plans for Hulu, Answered
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Streamliner
At your service.
A “one-app experience” is coming.Like Thanos’s conquest in Avengers: Infinity War, it looked inevitable that Disney would buy out Hulu. Now months later, Iger is snapping his fingers to fulfill his promise made at Disney’s second-quarter financial-earnings call earlier this year. It was made official in early November that the Walt Disney Company would pay up for Comcast’s stake in Hulu for the hefty price tag of $8.6 billion, at least. And before that news, Disney rolled out a brand-new dual bundle of Hulu and Disney+ that is paving the road for the upcoming “one-app experience” Iger’s teased. He also made sure to clarify that Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+ wouldn’t actually be going away. If all this consolidation and app wrangling has you scratching your head, we’ve done our best to answer a few basic questions about what to expect from Disney’s streaming services moving forward.
What’s happening with Hulu and Disney+?
As of right now, Hulu and Disney+ have not been merged yet. Disney and Comcast are still ironing out contract details before the former company completely buys out Comcast’s one-third stake in Hulu on December 1. So, Iger’s “one-app experience” is still not here, but for now both streaming services are available to buy together in a bundle or separately, if Marvel or Star Wars isn’t your cup of tea. Worth noting, though: Disney has started to do more and more dual premieres, meaning shows like Goosebumps and Marvel’s upcoming series Echo are debuting their new seasons on both services.
Are Disney+ or Hulu going away?
Iger has touted a “one-app experience” enough times to maybe give you pause, but currently, the company has no plans to get rid of either of their two streaming services. He’s made it clear that Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+ will continue to be their own stand-alone services, though the former two will definitely start to have more overlap in terms of shows and movies available in their libraries. The“one-app experience” that is planned to come out later this year won’t likely be a total combination of the two, so, no Dislu+.
Do I have to download a new app?
No. This will manifest as an updated version of the current Disney+ app. No new downloads!
How much will this new version of the app cost?
We don’t know yet, but we assume it will be comparable to the current pricing of the Disney Duo Bundles — which offers Disney+ and Hulu together without ESPN+. The “Duo Premium” bundle is currently priced at $19.99/month and the ad-supported Duo bundle is $9.99/month. It’s always possible, maybe even likely, that it could discount the revised app somehow, to juice new sign-ups.
What about ESPN+? Will that be in there?
No. ESPN+ will remain a separate entity, as far as we know. Iger has characterized the plan as, basically, folding the existing Duo Basic plan of the Disney Bundle, which includes Disney+ and Hulu, into an option on the Disney+ app — rather than making users toggle between apps. For now, ESPN+ is staying right where it is.
Why is Disney doing this?
The answer is always money! As competitors like Netflix and Warner Bros. Discovery also know, streaming empires are expensive to build and maintain — and the businesses are not yet profitable. (Disney’s streaming business reported a loss of $387 million in the last quarter, and that was a relatively strong one.) Iger’s mandate when he returned to replace the last Bob as CEO was to turn the ship around. (As part of that strategy, Disney laid off around 7,000 workers this year, and Iger managed to make himself a Hollywood villain during the writer and actor strikes.) He and his lieutenants have concluded a single app is the path forward: “We think that by making it available as a one-app experience it will increase engagement and increase our opportunity in terms of serving digital ads and growing our advertising business,” he said, also noting viewers wouldn’t have to toggle between apps. The advertiser piece of it is huge; Disney+ followed its competitors in offering ads last year, and a larger, broader single product gives Disney a lot more flexibility on the ad market.
Iger also pointed out that the company has already had some prior success managing a broad, general-interest streaming app, versus a trio of apps geared toward family entertainment, general programming, and sports. “Outside the United States, we created that with Star,” he said. “It’s working quite well, and it’s one of the reasons why we are going to launch that as an advertiser-supported platform.”
All of this sounds very Max. Is it related to the company pulling stuff off Disney+ earlier this year?
Uh, yes, in the sense that the answer is still money. As Disney’s CFO, Christine McCarthy, announced on the second-quarter earnings call: “We will be removing certain content from our streaming platforms and currently expect to take an impairment charge of approximately $1.5 to $1.8 billion.” (An “impairment charge” basically means a loss in value of a certain asset.) On the third-quarter call, Disney reported it had taken $1.02 billion in restructuring and impairment charges.
When exactly does this “one-app experience” launch?
It will arrive by the end of the calendar year, but beyond that, we have no specifics.
This post has been updated with new details throughout.
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Your Urgent Questions About Disney’s Plans for Hulu AnsweredncG1vNJzZmivp6x7t8HLrayrnV6YvK57wKuropucmnyltdKnnLJloKHCtHnHrqOuZZOkuqO1zZ6bZqukp7KiucinnmaZoKV7qcDMpQ%3D%3D