‘Stealth mode’: how Disney overtook Netflix in streaming wars

theguardian.com:

It might have taken the Walt Disney company less than three years to overtake Netflix in streaming subscribers, but its road to domination started more than 15 years ago with a carefully planned $100bn (£81bn) strategy to reinvigorate its empire for 21st century viewers.

The combination of Netflix priming a global audience for the streaming era and the serendipitous launch of Disney+ at the start of the pandemic, a service populated with crown jewel franchises such as Star Wars and Marvel, transformed what had been viewed as Disney’s late mover disadvantage into unprecedented breakneck growth.

Just 16 months after launch, a bargain-priced Disney+ hit 100 million subscribers – a feat Netflix took a decade to accomplish – and combined with the US streaming services Hulu and ESPN+, the company has now edged ahead with 222 million subscribers.

When it comes to winning the global streaming war, content is king. Disney, the owner of the most successful Hollywood film and TV studio in history, is the home of many of the world’s biggest and most-coveted franchises and characters thanks to a multibillion dollar buying spree that started in the noughties.

In 2006, a year before Netflix made the pivot from DVDs by post to streaming that would ultimately revolutionise traditional TV viewing, Disney spent $7.4bn buying Apple founder Steve Jobs’s Pixar, the animation hit factory behind Toy Story Finding Nemo and The Incredibles.

This was followed in 2009 by the surprise $4bn purchase of Marvel Comics’ superhero universe, bringing in a multitude of characters including Iron Man and Captain America, taking Disney into new live-action territory.

The third transformational buyout came when Disney snapped up George Lucas’s Lucasfilm, the