ROBYN BECK/AFP/Getty Images Netflix CEO Reed Hastings announced Netflix’s country expansive during a keynote address, January 6, 2016 at the CES 2016.
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“I think there’s been pent-up demand for Netflix outside of the few geographies they were available in previously”, Brian Blau, research director at Gartner, told Reuters. The company is now present in 190 countries worldwide. However, the company’s online TV service is still unavailable in China, the world’s second largest economy. That effort has required careful negotiation with big Hollywood studios. “Right now we’re in the relationship-building phase”, Hastings said.
“We want the citizens of the world to have the same content”.
Netflix will not yet be available in China, though the company continues to explore options for providing the service.
Nevertheless, investors were delighted with Netflix’s quantum leap across the globe. Before Wednesday’s announcement, the company had operations in 60 countries.
Shares of Netflix jumped 2.24 percent this morning to $120.31. The widespread availability should help Netflix massively boost audience numbers, now totaling more than 70 million homes.
Increasingly, Netflix has been buying material that only can be seen on its service, with more than 600 hours of original programming lined up for this year.
Established in 1997 as a mail-order movie service, Netflix has evolved to become a leading streaming service with over 69 million subscribers and its own award-winning shows, including House of Cards and Orange Is the New Black.
Where in the world is Netflix available?
China and Syria have yet to join on adopting the streaming service, but Hastings assured fans saying “We’re continuing to work on that and we’re very patient”.
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The Basic package is priced at Rs 500, and will allow to stream unlimited video content from its servers to just one screen (device) at a time. That is up almost 50 per cent on the same period next year.
