Korea’s original’Sweet Home’ watched 22 million households worldwide
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(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Jeong-mo Lee, Jeong-Hyun Koo = The number of subscribers to Netflix, an online video service (OTT) company in the United States, exceeded 200 million last year, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on the 19th (local time).
Netflix announced that the number of subscribers as of the end of last year was 23.7 million, an increase of 8.5 million during the fourth quarter alone.
As a result, Netflix subscribers exceeded 100 million in the third quarter of 2017, and then doubled again in three years.
The number of subscribers increased over the past year was 37 million, the highest ever.
Netflix’s growth last year was also attributed to the increased demand for streaming services as people spend more time at home in the aftermath of the novel coronavirus infection (Corona 19).
In addition to Netflix, subscribers to rival OTT companies such as Walt Disney’s’Disney+’ and Warner Media’s’HBO Max’ also increased.
When looking at the number of subscribers increased by region in the fourth quarter of last year, Netflix had 860,000 subscribers in North America, including the United States and Canada, compared to 2 million in Asia. In addition, South America increased by 1.2 million and Europe, Middle East and Africa increased by 4.5 million.
Thanks to this, Netflix’s fourth quarter sales were $6.64 billion, up from the same period last year ($5.45 billion).
While Asia has emerged as the second largest region leading Netflix’s growth, Netflix cited the expansion of investment in Korean content as the background.
Netflix has invested about 770 billion won in Korean content from 2015 to the present. Last year, the company established’Netflix Entertainment Ltd’, a new corporation that fully supports Korean content-related work, demonstrating its determination to produce more Korean content and expand investment. Earlier this year, it signed a multi-year lease contract with content studios in Paju-si and Yeoncheon-gun, Gyeonggi-do to lay the foundation for long-term production of Korean original content.
Netflix especially emphasized the propaganda of the Korean original series’Sweet Home’, which was released in December last year. This work is highly acclaimed as a Korean creature drama, and it was counted that 22 million paid subscription households around the world watched it in the first four weeks after the work was released. ‘Sweet Home’ is a local area that Netflix released at the same time, such as’Aris in Borderlands’ (18 million households),’Selena’ (25 million households), and’Christmas Today’ (26 million households). They lined up with the original works.
“We are very grateful that Korea’s’Sweet Home’ has provided a place for the world to talk together across borders and language barriers,” said Kim Min-young, vice president of content for Netflix Korea, Southeast Asia, Australia and New Zealand. said.
However, Netflix net profit was $542 million, down from the fourth quarter of the previous year ($587 billion).
In announcing its operating results on the day, Netflix announced that it will consider buying back shares this year based on cash flow.
Accordingly, Netflix’s stock price surged 12% in after-hours trading after the market close.
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2021/01/20 09:26 sent