NYT: Hulu planning an IPO?

By on Aug 16, 2010 at 7:27 AM
General August 16, 2010

The New York Times is reporting that streaming video site hulu.com is in talks with investment banks to go public as soon as this fall. The Times cites “people briefed on the matter,” and goes on to say that the IPO could “value the company at more than $2 billion.” Hulu is a joint venture of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation, the Walt Disney Company, NBC Universal, and a private equity firm. A recent change in comScore’s reporting methodology caused Hulu’s monthly viewership numbers to drop from 43.5 million in May to 24 million in June. Things aren’t all bad for the video service though; comScore did register that Hulu served up 556 million ads in June of this year, which outpaces all other video sites including YouTube. What do you think? If Hulu went public would you buy? Just another dot com destined for failure on Wall Street?

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13 Comments

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  • Smelly Dead Fish

    Hulu is dead, a waste.

  • http://www.techandfit.com Justin

    I would have trouble purchasing Hulu at this point as I do not see it gaining ground now or in the future in the mobile market space. Hulu is a heavy demand on bandwidth and I personally feel tech is moving to the way of smartphones and tablets which promote mobility. Hulu needs to figure out mobile marketing and apps before going public or have a quick plan to get there.

    • andyg8180

      you do know hulu has an iphone mobile app right? I’m not defending them since they charge for their service and still show double the ads from when they first started, but they are definitly ahead of places like netflix on the mobile front…

      I would have a hard time buying because even non-geeky people like us who troll the tech sites are getting sick of going from one ad per commercial break to 2 ads per commercial break.

    • Tdot34

      Yes because people would rather watch their favorite show on their mobile phones than the 52″ HD screen in their living room…

  • Jason

    Hulu Plus is huge fail. Why would I pay more for hulu than netflix???

    • tk-093

      Easy. I will give you an example. I just got into the TV show Bones. Seasons 1 through 4 are on Netflix. Season 5 just ended a few months ago and it is not on Netflix. It’s on Hulu Plus along with the full seasons of tons of TV shows from this last season that I can’t get anywhere else.

      Does everybody have that need, nope. But guess what? You have the choice to not get it. Choice rules.

  • TONY

    Netflix is still ahead of them as far as shows and movies. With Hulu showing free time slots for a lot of shows, it’s $10 plus subscription is crazy. I can watch old episodes for the same price on netflix and see NO ads. There should be NO ads for a premium subscription.

    • Tdot34

      True, but Hulu is joint venture between the big network companies, so of course they are going to show ads. But you are right there should be no ads for a premium subscription. I am surprised they haven’t pulled their license from Netflix and created a monopoly for streaming tv content on the web.

      There is always Megavideo

    • tk-093

      Tony, see my post above. It has shows that Netflix does not have yet. Between Hulu+ and Netflix my need for cable is getting smaller and smaller. Now I just need ESPN on my Xbox and I am golden.

  • illycut

    This would be a play to get more working capital for a company that is essentially blowing thrpugh cash. Their debtEquity ratio would be great, but i wonder if that move would give the studios an exit from the absorbment amount of money they seeded that venture with.

  • Chut Pata

    I tried Hulu, then went back to Netflix. Netflix is cheap, commercial free, and does not require a computer as it can run on my PS3 and WII.

  • Moosebump

    Someone needs to explain to me how Netflix works?
    They charge $10/m and people cancel their $70 cable bill. They sign $billion content deals with EPIX while cable companies refuse to pay small incremental carriage fees.
    Somewhere along the way $60 went missing. The cable company is probably out some of that. (with Comcast buying NBC Universal, what are the chances Netlfix gets their content). Oh wait, Netflix has no ads so someone just lost 12 minutes of ads per hour too. Oh yeah, Blockbuster and Cable VOD no longer rent you any movies….
    something is wrong here.

  • Tony

    Hulu lost viewers because the major TV season is over. It should go back up again in Sept/Oct.

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