Netflix Wins Strategic Licensing Deal with Miramax

As digital licensing negotiations heat up, it’s heartening to see Netflix pull another big win from a new deal with Miramax. Netflix announced the multi-year agreement today, which includes instant streaming of a number of movies in the Miramax library, from Academy Award winners like “Shakespeare in Love,” and “The English Patient,” to cult favorites like “Chasing Amy” and “Pulp Fiction.”

The win for Netflix is important for a number of reasons. First, as Will Richmond points out, it shows how big a role movies still play in the Netflix model, even though TV series have gotten more attention of late. Second, the VOD company noted that the deal with Miramax marks the first time Miramax titles have been made available through a digital subscription service, showing that Netflix carries significant clout as a distribution partner. And third, although terms were not disclosed, the agreement shows Netflix can and is willing to compete financially even now that content owners understand that digital delivery doesn’t mean giving away licensing rights for pennies on the dollar. [UPDATE: paidContent is putting the financial terms at likely more than $100 million.]

Miramax films will be available on Netflix starting in June, with titles added on a rotating basis. Streaming access will be available across TVs (presumably through Rokus, game consoles, and more), tablets, computers, and smartphones.

5 thoughts on “Netflix Wins Strategic Licensing Deal with Miramax”

  1. Titles will be added on a rotating basis? Does that mean added AND removed on a regular basis? If so, ugh, bored with this already. If it just means it’ll be a while before they have all the titles added, that’s fine as long as “Pulp Fiction” is added early. I just want to see that opening again…

  2. “Bring out the gimp!”

    Depends on whether the Miramax licensing deal is for HD, SD, or Starz-Super-Low-D.

    Bring out the gimp in HD! The Miramax catalog in HD might keep me subscribing. There are a whole bunch of cool indie titles in Harvey’s garage. But I’m running out of HD to watch in Netflix…

  3. “Titles will be added on a rotating basis? Does that mean added AND removed on a regular basis? If so, ugh, bored with this already.”

    That’s how it’s got to work.

    Either you rent/buy individual titles ala carte, which gets expensive, or you subscribe to services with a windowing scheme on their content.

    Got to pay the piper for the song one way or the other.

    (The third way is to exploit non-streaming services with a windowing scheme by locally caching their content, but that’s an advanced topic.)

  4. You’d think more companies would want to make a deal with what is effect the largest “cable provider” out there since Netflix has more subscribers than Comcast (the largest true cable provider).

    Netflix should have as much if not more bargaining power than Comcast. Except for that fact that Comcast basically owns Universal which means you won’t be seeing a deal with Universal any time soon.

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