Hulu Streaming Its Way Into Netflix’s Market Share?

April 2, 2010 - By Erin Stuelke

After announcing in a New York Times article that Hulu has been profitable for two quarters, Jason Kilar, the company’s CEO also admitted they are “open to subscriptions as a complement to an ad-supported model.”  He stated, “Our mission is to help people discover the world’s premium content…”  And if bringing a subscription option to the the currently free service helps accomplish that goal, it is something the company seems willing to do.

The article also went on to say that Hulu’s interest in moving toward a subscription service “is coming under increasing pressure from the companies that supply its content.”  According to ComScore, the article states, “monthly video streams have more than tripled in a year.”  Kilar also indicated that by summer 2010, revenues could hit $100 million, the revenue for the whole of 2009.  Hulu’s suppliers want to start earning more money as the service becomes more popular and pushing for a subscription service on top of the ad-based service Hulu already offers, is another way to do just that.

Currently, Hulu is only available on computers, having refused to allow services like XBox Live to stream videos to viewers’ HDTVs. The reason being “because that would siphon away viewers from cable and satellite subscriptions, a steady revenue source for media companies.”  However, the article revealed that Hulu might move away from computer-only access to testing an iPad application, but there are still no indications if and when it would allow streaming to televisions.  Hulu hasn’t even released an iPhone app despite market demand.

A subscription service for Hulu would certainly be a nice addition, especially for those willing to pay to avoid advertisements.  But if Hulu is to compete with the widely popular Netflix, it will have to start supporting streaming directly to the living room and on a variety of platforms like Netflix.

Source: Successes (and Some Growing Pains) at Hulu [NY Times]