When there was an Internet boom, there was tremendous hiring and spending until the bill came due. We see that with streaming services now, with so many services cutting back on the costs of production as well as merging excess services by the same company (Paramount+ with Showtime and Discovery with HBO MAX).
Perhaps this shows that the industry is maturing, but I think it has to do with the fact that there are. Just way too many services and the subscriber growth isn’t there for too many services.
Comcast’s Peacock services recorded losses of $2.5 billion for the full year alongside investment in the streaming service. With investment in Peacock, Comcast President Mike Cavanagh said the company expects losses to peak around $3 billion in 2023 and steadily improve from there. Disney has lost about $4 billion over Disney Plus.
Until there is true subscriber growth and/or consolidation in the industry, these providers will cut back on spending on original content since the expenditures are just insane.
