Ted SarandosCo-CEO

Reed was very clear that all entertainment was eventually going to come into the home over the internet. At the time, streaming did not exist and downloads were too slow and expensive. But he saw the long-term potential of the internet and designed our early DVD cue systems around that future.

We were solving a marketing and matching problem rather than a distribution problem. The internet allowed us to help customers find movies they would love out of thousands of choices. We wanted to efficiently connect niche films with the specific audiences who would appreciate them without massive advertising costs.

We do not view theatrical releases as competition. It is a rich, beautiful ecosystem. Our data shows that people who watch movies on Netflix are also the ones who love going to the theater. A strong theater industry strengthens the relationship consumers have with cinema, which benefits us all.

We compete for general screen time, particularly the screen in the living room. When a consumer picks up their remote, we want Netflix to be their first choice. We do not compete directly with short-form mobile video apps like Tik Tok because they serve a very different, free consumer behavior.

We do not use our algorithm to trick you into clicking play or to reinforce political biases. Our goal is to match you with stories you will genuinely love, even if they are in a language or genre you have never watched before. It is about expanding tastes, not narrowing them.

By using our personalization algorithms, we can confidently present foreign-language content to viewers in other countries. For example, the Indian film Dhurandhar became the most-watched non-English movie on Netflix globally this year, showing how high-quality local storytelling can easily cross international borders.

No, it has crossed over significantly to non-Indian audiences. We recorded three point five billion hours of viewing for Indian content globally this year. A large portion of that viewing comes from international audiences in countries like the United States and the United Kingdom who have no cultural connection to India.

India is a massive, diverse market that is historically underscreened in terms of theaters. We realize you cannot run our operations from California. We established a local office of hundreds of people in Mumbai who understand local sensibilities, enabling us to commission authentic series and win national awards.

It was a crash course in the complexity of the country. We would fall asleep in one region and wake up in another, feeling as if we had landed on a completely different planet. It reinforced the lesson that there is no single India, and that creative decisions must be made locally.

Data only tells you what worked in the past, whereas audiences are always looking for something they have never seen before. We rely on creative executives who have the instincts and courage to override the data. We use data to understand the economics of production, but greenlighting is driven by gut.

Squid Game was rejected by traditional studios for twelve years. It was twice as expensive as a typical Korean series. Data would have suggested it was too risky and niche for a global audience. But the team believed in it, and our algorithm helped it spread globally in days.

Classy and massy are industry labels, but consumers do not judge their entertainment that way. They want to be engaged. If I could restart our India operations, I would have launched popular, mass-market shows alongside high-end scripted dramas like Sacred Games. We must serve all tastes under one roof.

Major sports league rights are typically a loss leader for broadcasters. They are extremely expensive and yield low profit margins because audiences will immediately follow the sport if it moves to another service. We prefer to invest in eventizing specific sporting events, like Christmas Day football games.

I wanted to be a journalist because I viewed them as heroes who made the world feel smaller and safer by introducing people to one another. When I realized I was a poor writer, I pivoted to home video. Entertainment serves the same purpose as journalism by building empathy and curiosity.

We view artificial intelligence as a creator tool rather than a cost-saving measure. We use it for pre-visualization to design complex or dangerous shots safely, and in post-production to accelerate visual effects. If a tool does not make the final story better, it is not worth using.

We have a highly successful organic growth model. We evaluated the Warner Brothers Discovery deal because they had valuable intellectual property, but we were only willing to buy at the right price. When the price rose, we walked away. We prefer building our own franchises over relying on acquisitions.

Greg and I agreed early on that we would pull no punches and disagree openly in front of our teams on key decisions. However, we have complementary skills. I yield to Greg on technology decisions, and he yields to me on creative ones. We align on ninety-five percent of choices.