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Disney’s 14-Year Bet Is Saving Its Life
Long before it got lucky with the timing of Disney+, it was wise enough to buy Pixar, Star Wars, Marvel, and Fox
It was only last November that the Walt Disney Company introduced its own streaming service, Disney+. At the time, pulling its intellectual property from other services and building an exclusive destination for all things Disney seemed like a plausible gamble — but by no means a certain one. After all, this was a plunge into a full-on streaming war with Netflix, Apple, and HBO.
But looking back, the bet doesn’t merely seem smart — it also seems like incredibly lucky timing. Seven months into the pandemic — with movie theaters idle, film and TV studios facing mass layoffs, and theme parks closed or sparsely attended — Disney+ has turned out to be a lifeline. The service already has around 60 million subscribers, and even Netflix’s Reed Hastings has praised it. The House of Mouse must shiver to consider what it would be right now if it had plotted the launch for November 2021.
As if to acknowledge all this, Disney has now announced a restructuring explicitly focusing its entertainment divisions on a streaming-centric direct-to-consumer strategy. In other words: less emphasis on gathering audiences through theaters, networks, and parks, and…
