The Netflix Effect

From being a premium service to programming cinematic shows for the masses, Netflix India has come a long way in the past 10 years.

- Ajita Shashidhar

FORTUNE INDIA'S LUXURY issue a year ago had a feature on 'quiet luxury'. Whoever we spoke to from the luxury space while researching for this story told us to watch the 'Netflix show' Succession, which epitomises quiet luxury. But we couldn't find it on Netflix. That's because Succession is an HBO original!

The fact that the who's who of India's luxury industry inadvertently pointed towards Netflix—despite Succession being an HBO original—made it apparent that the U.S. streaming platform had become the default entertainment destination for the upper classes in India. Be it House of Cards, Bridgerton, or Sacred Games, Netflix has indeed been offering quality original content to Indian audiences. In fact, co-founder Reed Hastings, on several occasions, had talked about his dream to become the next HBO without the hassle of a cable subscription. Life is serendipitous—if the $72-billion Netflix-Warner Bros. Discovery deal fructifies, HBO would become a part of Netflix's portfolio.

While the entertainment industry awaits with bated breath to see who would finally acquire Warner Bros. (though Warner has turned down Paramount Skydance's hostile bid of $108.4 billion, the latter has bolstered its offer with a $40.4 billion irrevocable personal guarantee from Oracle founder Larry Ellison, the father of Paramount CEO David Ellison), in India, Netflix’s strategy has remained constant in the past decade: profitably acquire subscribers.