Netflix (NFLX) Spends Kingly Sums in Goal to Produce Best Original Content
Netflix (Nasdaq: NFLX) has started to produce some original content to wane itself off of being fully reliant on third-party providers, but it might be debatable whether that content is coming in cheaply enough to justify.
According to Creative Artists Agency lawyer Peter Micelli, who spoke at the UCLA Entertainment Symposium last Friday, Netflix might have shelled out up to $4.5 million per episode for House of Cards. By comparison, he noted, the smash-hit from AMC (Nasdaq: AMCX) Mad Men ran about $2.5 million for the fourth season that ran in 2011.
Micelli also sees Netflix spending about $4 million per episode on Hemlock Grove and Orange is the New Black.
(All numbers are Micelli's own estimates, according to Variety.)
Netflix might nee to spend the extra dough, however, with competition always looking to take away business. Micelli noted that Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) might initially focus its original programming on scripted comedies with budgets of $1 million per episode or less. Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT), which recently hired former CBS (NYSE: CBS) executive Nancy Tellem, will also be looking to do more with its next-generation Xbox. Tellem is Microsoft's Entertainment & Digital Media president.
Shares of Netflix are down 2.4 percent Monday.
According to Creative Artists Agency lawyer Peter Micelli, who spoke at the UCLA Entertainment Symposium last Friday, Netflix might have shelled out up to $4.5 million per episode for House of Cards. By comparison, he noted, the smash-hit from AMC (Nasdaq: AMCX) Mad Men ran about $2.5 million for the fourth season that ran in 2011.
Micelli also sees Netflix spending about $4 million per episode on Hemlock Grove and Orange is the New Black.
(All numbers are Micelli's own estimates, according to Variety.)
Netflix might nee to spend the extra dough, however, with competition always looking to take away business. Micelli noted that Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) might initially focus its original programming on scripted comedies with budgets of $1 million per episode or less. Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT), which recently hired former CBS (NYSE: CBS) executive Nancy Tellem, will also be looking to do more with its next-generation Xbox. Tellem is Microsoft's Entertainment & Digital Media president.
Shares of Netflix are down 2.4 percent Monday.