A Job Posting, Subscriber Growth, And The Stepping Down Of Co-CEO Reed Hastings

A string of movements and announcements from the global streaming service has created movements for the industry and the company itself. Starting with an eye-raising job posting, an earnings report, and the stepping down of co-CEO Reed Hastings.

NetflixNFLX
has posted a job role based in San Jose, California for a flight attendant on one of its private jets with the successful candidate set to be paid up to $385,000 per year. The flight attendant will be primarily stationed on board a Gulfstream G550 jet, judged as a “Super Midsize Jet”.

The posting highlights key traits which the successful applicant must have including the ability to “operate with little direction and a lot of self-motivation” and to work with “independent judgement, discretion and outstanding customer service skills”.

$385,000 is reported by Netflix as being on the high-end for the position, however, the amount will be decided upon by the experience of the individual as well as other factors.

As it pertains to salary Netflix said in the overview of the posting, “The overall market range for this role is typically $60,000 – $385,000. This market range is based on total compensation (vs only base salary), which is in line with our compensation philosophy.”

The job posting has raised curiosity as the streaming service cut hundreds of employee positions last year amid a shrinking subscriber base.

Netflix, however, has now added 7.66 million paid subscribers during the fourth quarter. This is greater than the 4.57 million that Wall Street expected the service to gain. This is also the first quarter where Netflix’s advertising tier service has been reflected in the report. The service launched in November and Netflix has declined to state how many of the new subscribers are from the ad tier.

In its prerecorded earnings call on Thursday 19th January, the streamer noted that generally people were not switching from a premium plan to the ad-supported version and that so far they had seen comparable engagement between the ad tier and premium service subscribers.

As a result of the company’s announcement Netflix’s share price, which fell by around 38 per cent in 2022, grew more than 7 per cent in after-hours trading to $338.25. The market value of the company now stands at more than $140 billion.

On the new advertising model, Spencer Neumann, the chief financial officer, said on the call: “We wouldn’t be getting into this business if it couldn’t be a meaningful portion of our business,”

“We’re over $30 billion in revenue, almost $32 billion in revenue, in 2022 and we wouldn’t get into a business like this if we didn’t believe it could be bigger than at least 10% of our revenue.”

The company has predicted that revenue growth in the first quarter of 2023 will grow by 4%, this prediction coincides with Netflix beginning its paid sharing program which they’re hoping will generate revenue from users who were sharing passwords with people outside of their homes. So people that were borrowing accounts will sign up for their own service.

In further news from the platform, co-CEO and founder Reed Hastings is stepping down from his role and moving to be the company’s executive chairman. Current chief operating officer, Greg Peters, will now join Ted Sarandos in the co-CEO role. Hastings founded the firm in 1997, elevating to the role of co-CEO in 2020. Hastings had to navigate COVID and the drastically changed landscape of entertainment that the pandemic brought to the industry.

Bela Bajaria, the company’s global head of television, will now step in as chief content officer.

Sarandos said on the transition in a written statement, “I want to thank Reed for his visionary leadership, mentorship and friendship over the last 20 years. We’ve all learned so much from his intellectual rigor, honesty and willingness to take big bets — and we look forward to working with him for many more years to come.”

“2022 was a tough year, with a bumpy start but a brighter finish,” the company said in a statement. “We believe we have a clear path to reaccelerate our revenue growth: continuing to improve all aspects of Netflix, launching paid sharing and building our ads offering. As always, our north stars remain pleasing our members and building even greater profitability over time.”