When Bezos buys a lion... it comes with a whole movie studio. Amazon is reportedly in negotiations to purchase MGM for $9B. This would be the 'Zon's biggest move yet into entertainment. Amazon has made big investments in Prime Video, which attracted 175M viewers over the past year. But Netflix still gets most of Hollywood's spotlight. With this acquisition...
Coming to America... and the red carpet. Streamers are investing to become more Hollywood, less Chrome tab. In 2020, the 'Zon spent $11B on shows, movies, and music for Prime, up 40% from 2019. Netflix spent more than $17B on content last year, mostly on originals. But it's deeper than content splurges...
Streamers are becoming studios... In 2017, Netflix and Amazon became the first streamers to ever win Oscars (and there was pushback). Now, streamers are getting dozens of Oscar noms and spending billions on big originals. Meanwhile, studios are leaning into streaming. Think: Universal's Peacock, Warner's HBO Max, and Viacom's Paramount+ — plus, more direct-to-streaming releases.