Netflix India posts 75% profit in FY23, ad tier crosses 23 million users monthly

Netflix India: US-based streaming platform Netflix's India arm has registered a 75 per cent uptick in net profits at Rs 35.3 crore in the current fiscal.

The profits were at Rs 20.1 crore in FY22, as per Netflix India’s most recent filings with the Registrar of Companies sourced via PrivateCircle Research.

 The revenue from operations for the company was up 24 per cent at Rs 2,214.1 crore, as compared with Rs 1,783.6 crore in the same period last year. 

Expenses for the company inflated to Rs 2,232.5 crore from Rs 1,802.3 crore, as per the research.

The streaming platform, which competes with OTT platforms like Amazon Prime, SonyLIV, Zee5 and telco Jio’s streaming arm, has competitive price plans for mobile at Rs 149 per month, with other plans priced between Rs 199 to Rs 649 per month based on number of screens and profiles it can be used on. It also has partnerships with mobile data providers for boosting user scale.

Reed Hastings, CEO of the company had lauded India’s data revolution thanks to cheap rates by data providers like Jio, which introduced more customers to streaming services.

In the US, Netflix’s ad-supported tier has reached over 23 million global active users monthly, their advertising chief Amy Reinhard has said.

The ad tier plan had reached 15 million active users per month one year after the service was launched, Reinhard told Variety Magazine.

Launched in November 2022 in 12 markets including the United States, the ad tier plan was to attract more customers and add a new revenue stream for the streaming giant as competition for online viewers intensified.

Netflix has been hiking prices on its ad-free options to nudge more subscribers to the other tier, where commercials help bring in more revenue.

"Of Netflix's customers on ad-supported plans, 85 per cent of are streaming on the platform for more than two hours per day," the report quoted Reinhard as saying at the Variety Entertainment Summit at CES 2024 at Las Vegas' Aria Resort and Casino.

Netflix is set to pull ahead of Disney+ in the race for US advertising dollars next year, as per an Insider Intelligence report projections last month. The company had cracked down on password sharing as well as hiked rates, which pulled more viewers to its ad-supported plan.

(With Reuters Inputs)