Comcast’s Peacock is strutting its stuff on center stage.
The company announced more details about its upcoming service Peacock at a special investor presentation Thursday. The latest entrant in the streaming revolution is expected to draw users away from traditional cable and satellite subscriptions and more towards over-the-top and subscription replacements.
Peacock can be seen as a way for Comcast to hedge their losses and plan for the future. The service will have three tiers. An ad-supported version with 7,500 hours of programming will be free for everyone. There will also be a full version that includes 15,000 hours of programming with original content, which will be $4.99 for an ad-supported version and $10 for an ad-free version. Comcast and Cox customers will get the full ad-supported version for free. Of the major streaming subscription services, only Hulu currently allows for traditional advertising.
The service previously announced it will be the exclusive home for hit content including “The Office,” “30 Rock,” the “Law and Order” series, and “Parks and Recreation,” as well as Universal movies like the “Fast & Furious” and “Back to the Future” franchises. It will also have original series like reboots of “Punky Brewster,” “Battlestar Galactica” and “Saved by the Bell,” in addition to a new series based of the novel “Brave New World” and the podcast “Dr. Death.”
Comcast is expected to spend about $2 billion on content. New shows including “MacGruber” and DreamWorks Animation series like “Madagascar: A Little Wild” will debut on the service. “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” and “Late Night with Seth Meyers” will post at 8 p.m. ET ahead of its late-night airings. And, a joint-venture live-news service between NBC News and Sky will stream on the platform.
As a telecommunications company, Comcast has been in an interesting position as the number of cable subscriptions dwindle. The five largest pay-TV services lost a total of 3.2 million customers in 2018 or about 4.2 percent, according to their company reports. The numbers have continued to decline, including a 1.74 million subscriber drop in Q3 of 2019 alone, according to Leichtman Research Group.
To launch the service, Comcast is pulling many of its shows from rival streamers. It reportedly paid $500 million for a five-year deal to move “The Office” off of Netflix and onto Peacock. It is also expected to move shows from Hulu to Peacock once their current deals expire. Exclusivity rights with Hulu end as early as this year, and Comcast can cancel its licensing agreements starting in 2022. Comcast was previously a partial owner of Hulu, but the company sold its stake to Disney for $5.8 billion through a deal announced in May 2019.
Nvidia on Wednesday became the first public company to reach a market capitalization of $5 trillion. The ravenous appetite for the Silicon Valley company’s chips is the main reason that the company’s stock price has increased so rapidly since early 2023.
Chris Williamson, Chief Business Economist at S&P Global, breaks down September’s CPI print and inflation trends, explaining what it means for markets.
A big-screen adaptation of the anime “Chainsaw Man” has topped the North American box office, beating a Springsteen biopic and “Black Phone 2.” The movie earned $17.25 million in the U.S. and Canada this weekend. “Black Phone 2” fell to second place with $13 million. Two new releases, the rom-com “Regretting You” and “Springsteen — Deliver Me From Nowhere,” earned $12.85 million and $9.1 million, respectively. “Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc” is based on the manga series about a demon hunter. It's another win for Sony-owned Crunchyroll, which also released a “Demon Slayer” film last month that debuted to a record $70 million.
The Federal Aviation Administration says flights departing for Los Angeles International Airport were halted briefly due to a staffing shortage at a Southern California air traffic facility. The FAA issued a temporary ground stop at one of the world’s busiest airports on Sunday morning soon after U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy predicted that travelers would see more flights delayed as the nation’s air traffic controllers work without pay during the federal government shutdown. The hold on planes taking off for LAX lasted an hour and 45 minutes and didn't appear to cause continued problems. The FAA said staffing shortages also delayed planes headed to Washington, Chicago and Newark, New Jersey on Sunday.
Boeing workers at three Midwest plants where military aircraft and weapons are developed have voted to reject the company’s latest contract offer and to continue a strike that started almost three months ago. The strike by about 3,200 machinists at the plants in the Missouri cities of St. Louis and St. Charles, and in Mascoutah, Illinois, is smaller in scale than a walkout last year by 33,000 Boeing workers who assemble commercial jetliners. The president of the International Association of Machinists says Sunday's outcome shows Boeing hasn't adequately addressed wages and retirement benefits. Boeing says Sunday's vote was close with 51% of union members opposing the revised offer.
The stunning indictment that led to the arrest of more than 30 people — including Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier and other NBA figures — has drawn new scrutiny of the booming business of sports betting in the U.S. The multibillion-dollar industry has made it easy for sports fans — and even some players — to wager on everything from the outcome of games to that of a single play with just a few taps of a cellphone. But regulating the rapidly-growing industry has proven to be a challenge. Professional sports leagues’ own role in promoting gambling has also raised eyebrows.
