Extending Content Partnership
As avenues to watch TV continues to grow, cable operators are doing everything they can to retain subscribers who give up a pay-TV subscription for an alternative internet-based service. Such kinds of customers are called cord cutters. In order to retain them, one of the best internet providers has been giving customers accesses to Netflix on Xfinity® X1 platform since 2016.
Now, Comcast® has extended content partnership with the streaming service. In addition to that, the cable giant has announced that starting this month, it would bundle Netflix into some of their bundled TV packages given to both existing and potential customers. Comcast® is yet to reveal which TV package would have the streaming service subscription, but has said that accessibility to Netflix would differ as per the market.
If you subscribe to Comcast Xfinity® TV bundle and have a Netflix subscription, the monthly payment for the streaming service would show up on the cable invoice. So, going forward, you would only have to keep track of one invoice less each month.
Pay-TV Subscription
For Comcast®, to add Netflix to their TV bundles means to retain nationwide subscribers within the realm of the pay-TV subscription universe by keeping them from cord cutting. The cable provider has said that it has ended last year with 21.3m residential “video” customers, which was declined by 186,000 customers from 2016.
Netflix reported recently that it has around 55m customers in the US, but slow customer growth has oftentimes raised concerns regarding expansions of the streaming service’s customer base. “This is a big win for Netflix, which could use the Comcast® platform to boost its subscriber growth in the US market,” said the Senior Analyst at Investing.com, Haris Anwar. “This is an especially timely move as domestic subscriptions have shown some signs of peaking, making some investors nervous.”
In fact, even if some customers look for cable TV alternatives to stream their favorite shows, it is an irrefutable fact that millions of Netflix customers also have a Comcast® subscription. So, giving cord cutters enough reasons to stay on a mutual subscriber might do wonders to the customer growth of cable TV business of Comcast®. This is why most of the trade analysts and experts say that the prospect of the cable cum internet provider including Netflix in their TV bundles is actually twofold.
