Ten years ago, globally Netflix had $6.3 billion in revenue, $120 million in profit and a $50 billion valuation. Today, it’s $45 billion in revenue, $1 billion in profit and a $400 billion valuation. It has been a tremendous decade. The fact that this happened in entertainment is special. You never had a right to win. You started with DVDs, had no production, no distribution. Amazon and Apple had distribution. Disney had production. But Reed Hastings had a conviction and got you to buy into it.When I met Reed in 1999, he said all entertainment was going to come into the home on the internet at a time when the internet was too slow, too expensive. We were talking about downloading movies because streaming didn’t even exist. But it was clear that’s where this was going. Mailing DVDs and managing people’s queues was all about customer relationships, credit cards and taste preferences, so that you could use the power of the internet to help people find things in a world of almost infinite choices.The problem we were solving was marketing, not distribution or production. How do you get something right in front of the right person, so you don’t have to advertise to the entire country for a relatively small niche film to find the handful of people who are going to love it. (Left) Andrew Ure, VP, Netflix, with Clete Williams, Chief Global Affairs Officer, NetflixSo you thought your differentiation was marketing?Yeah. In the days of big theatrical distribution, the cost of moving prints around was low. The cost of production was high, but that was true for everybody. The cost of marketing, if you could make that system more efficient, could change the P&L (profit and loss) of a studio.When you started, you had to say provocative things like the theatre business wasn’t going to work. Every time a film does well in the theatre, do you get a target on your back?We’re not in the theatrical movie business. Whenever I’ve had anything to say about the theatrical movie business, it’s mostly an observation of stats and behaviour. What has been great is that people on Netflix love movies. They love to go to the movies or watch them at home. Our average member watches seven movies a month on Netflix globally, and sees one or two every year in the theatre. I’m not saying one is better than the other. It’s a rich ecosystem. I want our members, when they want to go out at night, to go to a movie because it strengthens their relationship with movies. (From left) Sandip Somany, Chairman & MD, Somany Impresa Group; Mahima Kaul, Director of Public Policy, Netlfix, and Monika Shergill, VP Content, NetflixDo you not see them as competition?Not at all. We compete for time. When you sit down, pick up the remote and push a button, we want it to be Netflix. We make sure every time you do that, you watch something you love. We want to become the first place you check for something to watch and the last thing you’d ever cancel.When you say you compete for screen time, are you competing with YouTube, Instagram and anything that you’re looking at on a screen?We don’t necessarily compete with YouTube on phones because what people are watching on phones tends to be much shorter, vertical and free. When you get onto the screen in your living room, that’s the screen time I’m talking about.Story continues below this adWhen we talk about algorithms, we often talk about polarisation and reinforcing biases. Netflix hasn’t been mentioned in that list. Why?We’re trying to find a movie you’re going to love; not trying to trick you into pushing play. That’s actually quite bad for our business. We’re trying to match something with you that you may not have thought you were going to love, and it turns out you did. That gives us an opportunity to tell stories from around the world. The biggest barrier to someone in Iowa watching a Bollywood movie is that they’ve never seen one before. If we can get them over that hump, and they watch it and love it, it opens the door. We’ve had an Indian movie or series in the global Top 10 every week since 2024. We have three-and-a-half billion hours of Indian content being watched on Netflix around the world this year. (From left) Anant Goenka, Ted Sarandos and Usha Kakade, founder and producer, Usha Kakade ProductionsIsn’t that skewed to Indians abroad? Indian content really hasn’t crossed over in the way Squid Game did for Korean content.When I travel around the world, particularly in India, I get asked — because of what happened with Squid Game or La Casa de Papel — that when India is going to have that moment. India has that moment all the time, and it’s much more likely to be in cinema. When we made Sacred Games, it was a different kind of television. But most of the history and what’s coming through is likely to come through in cinema.Recently, parliamentarians told you to tell more Indian stories. Have you scratched the surface in India?We’re thrilled with our success in India to date. We’ve been at it for 10 years and we’re still growing every year, month, quarter. With a population this size and an enormous appetite for entertainment, it’s dramatically underscreened. There are fewer movie theatre screens per person than in almost any country in the world. But we can solve that problem with all kinds of screens that can tell those stories.We brought India its first Academy Award for The Elephant Whisperers, and also won the International Emmy, had nominations for Vir Das and Delhi Crime, and won Best Hindi Film at the National Awards. Why many American companies have failed in India is because they think they understand India after making one movie that worked. But there are multiple Indias. Even to be successful locally, you have to travel across the country. We don’t do that from California. We do that from Mumbai. It’s an intense desire to be ingrained in the entertainment community, ecosystem and economy of India, but most importantly, with Indian fans. Our people here love Indian movies and television more than anyone in the world.Story continues below this adHow much of it is algorithm, and how much is the instinct of the local team?I always refer to it as very informed intuition. There’s no data in the world that could tell you to make this and don’t make that. You’ll be wrong all the time. Data only tells you what worked before, and audiences are always looking for something they haven’t seen.Is the audience always looking for something it has never seen before?They’re always looking to be surprised. There are things where you can spend some time because it’s comfortable. But what really moves the needle for a fan is, ‘I’ve never felt this way before.’ Those things don’t come in some rhythm or formula. You can’t reverse-engineer them. They come from a great idea, a visionary storyteller, the resources to bring that story to the screen, and a little bit of kismet. At the end of the day, it’s all in execution. You can get false security by looking at the data. Where we always win is when we have creative executives with such keen instincts and courage that they say, ‘I know what the data says. I’m telling you that’s wrong. This is going to work.’ Look at Squid Game. No data would have said to make it, certainly not for a global audience. In hindsight, everyone says, “Of course it was amazing.” But it was twice as expensive as any hour of Korean television ever produced. So yes, we have data, but if anybody made big creative decisions based only on data, that would be a fool’s errand.What about the role of the star? In India, I assume it’s important.Absolutely. The star is important, more than in other markets. But it’s the star and the vehicle. You can’t just put the star into a role people don’t necessarily want to see them in. Then, you’re starting from scratch.You had an offsite in India where you and Reed got on the Palace on Wheels and spent days discussing your India strategy. What came out of that?What I loved about that trip was how quickly it taught us there’s not one India. You go to sleep in one part of India and wake up in another. It’s like you’ve landed on another planet. It reinforced the importance of having a great local presence when making creative decisions for a market.Story continues below this adOne uniquely Indian way of classifying content is as ‘massy’ and ‘classy’. Do you think of the spectrum that way?I love that phrase. I had never thought of it that way. When we had the DVD business, we had more than 100,000 titles. What we learned was that people’s tastes are remarkably diverse. Every year, when you ran the reports, almost every one of those titles had been rented. That taught us that if you want to serve the world, you need something for everybody. I don’t think consumers love their massy choice any less than they love their classy choice. In India, you’ve got people who really love Lock Upp. And then you’ve got something like Musafir Cafe, a deliberate love story with beautifully shot landscapes. They sit right next to each other, serving gigantic audiences.Four big broadcasters in India could differentiate themselves purely through content. You could if a show was on Zee, Star, Sony or Colors without seeing the logo. Is that something what you want to do?No. Our real differentiator is no different today than it was 25 years ago, when we mailed discs: personalisation. To do that, you can’t be narrow. Compared with many brands you mentioned, Netflix was always a general entertainment brand because we carried 100,000 titles. That made it much easier when we moved into streaming.You have said that you’re not going to get into sports in India.I said we have a global live strategy that includes sports. It doesn’t include league sports like the whole season of anything. We’ve been fortunate enough to build a large business without a loss leader. For most television seasons of sports, that’s what they are. They bring an audience that you can pivot into something else. But it’s very difficult to make money on league sports because they’re expensive.In India, you’re not the largest, by subscriber base. With IPL, you’d get top of the funnel. Was there no temptation to do that?We were able to build this without it. A lot of great companies were born on those kinds of investments and eventually got squeezed out. We didn’t want dependence on any one thing.Story continues below this adWhat’s next for Netflix?There’s so much headroom in what we currently do. You could have asked me this question a year or two ago and we would have been completely wrong about some of the things that happened. We’re in a constant drive to entertain the world. That means adding new content and new types of content, and upping the game for an audience that expects it.You’ve put India’s Got Latent on Netflix, the same content that is also on YouTube.YouTube is sometimes a place where you discover things; no different from a film festival, film school or open casting call. In this case, the team was excited about the show. It came with a built-in audience and a popular host. It had all the elements people wanted, and we were able to bring it to Netflix.You tried to buy Warner Bros Discovery. Is Netflix going to keep looking for vertical integration?Our growth model has been and continues to be organic growth. We look at all opportunities when they come across. You would be crazy not to look and kick the tires. We don’t have 100 years of IP like a major studio. But that is a blessing because it has forced us to make some of the most original creative stories on the planet. We looked at the Warner Bros deal because it would have accelerated our business model a bit. But when it was no longer the right price, we were fine to walk away.So in build versus buy, you’re on the build side?We have always been builders.Story continues below this adAI is a controversial topic now. How should the media ecosystem think about it?The embrace of AI from Indian creators has been much more aggressive than anywhere in the world. I think it’s because we believe AI is a creator tool. Indian storytellers get excited about the opportunity to bring ambitious projects to the screen when the resources aren’t always there.We’ve had about 300 productions use AI tools. We use them for pre-visualisation, giving directors the opportunity to design complicated shots so they can film faster and safer. It’s been a game changer. But it has to make the story better, even better if it’s faster and cheaper. At the end of the day, if it’s not better, those things don’t matter.So you’re not considering AI a cost-saving tool yet?I anticipate there’ll be some cost savings, but they’ll get reinvested into what’s on screen. For instance, there are AI tools that can enable a filmmaker, using the data of the film they’ve already made, to do a quick pickup shot almost like a visual effect.Are there markets where you can’t tell the stories that should be told?Most decisions about what stories you can and can’t tell aren’t necessarily about whether you’re allowed to tell them. It may not be economically feasible. The story may make you angry. But ultimately, if not enough people watch it for what it costs to make, you often can’t make it.Story continues below this adBut the idea of making power centres uncomfortable through documentaries. Do you feel you need to push that more?I don’t think our role or motto is anything other than entertaining. If that serves our ability to entertain the world, that’s great. If it interferes, we should avoid that. Ted Sarandos at Express Adda.(Express photo by Renuka Puri)RAPID FIRE One lesson that Bollywood has taught you about storytelling.The best storytelling is timeless. What about Operation Safed Sagar got you most excited?The negative thing about my role is I get to see the cuts early. I watched the first couple of episodes without the VFX and the story itself was so engrossing that I was not distracted by the lack of the VFX. If, for whatever reason, Netflix no longer works out for you and you have the ability to choose to be the editor of any news organisation in the world, which one would it be?I look back now, and today I would be such a lousy news editor. I don’t think I would pick any of them. I would be a professional consumer.Story continues below this ad If you were forced to run Netflix looking at only one metric every day, what would that be?It’s an internal wonky word… love score. We have this ability to measure how much people really are loving what they are watching. I can’t tell you how we do that, but it’s part of the secret sauce. The last time you and Reed Hastings disagreed?Reed moved on from Netflix a while ago. So now I am the co-CEO with Greg (Peters). And we decided early on, that we would disagree violently with each other on things we really care about. And we would make sure that we didn’t pull punches with each other ever. Because the one thing we both care deeply about is the success of the business and we have complementary skill sets. That said, we agree about 95 per cent of the time and if we don’t, we duke it out. The last time you and Monika Shergill disagreed.Very rarely because Monica knows so much more about this market than I do. Why would I possibly disagree with her? The one series that is on another platform you wish was on yours.The Studio because I was in it. And now if I tell people to watch my episode, I have to tell them to watch Apple TV. If you have the opportunity to buy any of the following IPs from Warner Brothers Discovery for a price you like, which one would it be: Batman, The Big Bang Theory, Friends, Harry Potter, the entire CNN or TNT Sports.Harry Potter. If you think back to a franchise that has really stood the test of time, you probably have 20 that are legitimate and Harry Potter is certainly one of them. Sanjay Leela Bhansali or Martin Scorsese? Who went over budget?No comment. The best sequel that never got made?I wish we would have got to Mindhunter Part 3. We always anticipated there would be a third season but David Fincher got very busy making a film. And he is an unbelievably meticulous creator so he couldn’t just do two things at a time and he certainly didn’t want to short change either one. The one earnings call question that kept you up at night.None. That’s an honest answer. The most expensive production Netflix has ever done.Probably Rebel Moon. We made two very big budget movies back to back and released them back to back. The one marketing campaign that you loved that wasn’t done by Netflix.FX did a really amazing job of making The Bear feel like it was a much bigger show than it was. It was really because the marketing was so strong. One misconception about Netflix in India that you would like to change?Probably the classy massy one, which is understanding that we’re doing both. In the benefit of hindsight, do you think Sacred Games was not the right way to start?No. I wish we had done something like Lock Upp at the same time that we did Sacred Games. And knew that we eventually were going to do both. When you meet a first-time filmmaker, is there one tell that convinces you that they are talented?A rich understanding of the context of the story of film and storytelling. David Fincher and I had one of our first dinners together where we talked all night about just great movies and what made a movie better than all the others. And that was his observation on every great movie ever made or every career-defining performance, which is something I had not thought about until he articulated it that way. One piece of advice to a director who is preparing a pitch for Netflix.It’s a very bad idea to pitch me no matter where I am. That happens all the time and it’s not very productive for the idea. I would also say that film schools should have an entire course on just pitching. What is the most awkward place a story has been pitched to you?The one not so crazy location is that I will be out to dinner with my wife and another couple and someone will come to the table and pitch relentlessly. AUDIENCE QUESTIONS Debashish BhattacharyaDebashish BhattacharyaAdditional Director-General, the Broadband India ForumRegulation or creativity or innovation. Which do you choose? Censorship or self-regulation, what do you prefer ?India is a beautiful working model for self-regulation and self-censorship and we work closely with the government to make sure we are following everything we need to follow without having an onerous regulatory model. It’s important because you don’t want to interfere with creativity and you also need to be a responsible player. Our relationship with the government allows us to do that. India has always been a phenomenal free speech culture, so in the spirit of that, it has not been that tough. Sandip SomanySandip SomanyChairman & MD, Somany Impresa GroupWhat would you need to change in your secret sauce to be equally, if not more, successful 10 years from today?A lot of companies have a motto that they put on a plaque and never look at again. We actually run the business by that culture memo. Over the years it went from being a 170-page PowerPoint document to a couple of pages of memo. But at the core the values are intact. And you have to have great people to do this. You have to give them all the resources to do the best work of their life and get out of the way. It’s the last part that people trip up on a lot. That’s going to shepherd us into the next 10 years, which will look a lot like the last 10, but better and faster. Robin RoyRobin Roydocumentary and wildlife filmmakerNon-fiction filmmakers sometimes feel like stepchildren in the film world. Are we going to see a lot more stuff on Netflix which will be non-fiction? Is there a place for it and is it growing?Absolutely. I hope you’re seeing a lot of it on Netflix today. That Academy Award that we were able to bring home to India was for a documentary short. It has always been core to the business. I was a kid in Phoenix who had to travel for an hour and a half to the theatre to see a documentary on the Holocaust. What got me excited was this opportunity that no matter where you are in the world, you’d have access to a documentary which you mostly don’t. So there’s always going to be a place for that at Netflix. Shwetasree MajumderShwetasree MajumderManaging Partner, Fidus Law ChambersWith IP lawsuits rising, do you see AI platforms like Midjourney and MiniMax challenging your studio-quality short-form content by replicating protected IP from Squid Games and Stranger Things?We always have to be aware of what the audience is gravitating towards and how we serve that need. I have not fact checked it, but I heard that the big micro drama company in China switched to doing all AI-generated micro dramas and that the engagement in those dropped by 70per cent. But as it is right now, audiences are looking to either escape or connect when they engage in content in programming. And there’s something about the lack of humanity there that people are rejecting right now. Tavleen SinghTavleen Singhjournalist, author and political columnistWhen you started out, did you think that you would be this successful at becoming the entertainer of the world? And which country has been particularly difficult to work in?When I met Reed in ’99, he was clear we were going to be exactly what we are now. I was more skeptical whether it would get that big and certainly not that fast.Every country has its own nuances. People have individual tastes. The hardest thing to do is to be able to operate in those very bespoke environments. Sometimes it can be navigating regulatory environments and sometimes it is about understanding the local taste and sensibility. That can be difficult. Sonali dahiyaSonali dahiyaHead, Burgundy Private, private banking by Axis BankYou spoke about using AI in an industry where personalisation is key. What would you advise the CEOs reimagining businesses in the world of AI, and what would be the one thing you would tell them not to do?You have to figure out what is the use case for AI that advances your business initiative and don’t get caught up in this idea that you just have to be an AI because that is where all the investment is going. There are things that AI will completely transform and if we are mostly just running head first, it is important that people have a strategy of what they are going to use this tool for and how it will improve the business and on what dimensions are they investing versus being AI at any cost.