Netflix has consistently adapted to changing customer needs which has driven its success. It pivoted from DVDs to online streaming and focused on building its own content. Netflix also personalizes experiences through recommendations and categorization. Additionally, Netflix values its people and builds its culture and strategy around talent development, as evidenced by its detailed culture deck viewed over 20 million times. These factors have allowed Netflix to gain over 180 million subscribers globally through embracing change for customers and continuous innovation.

1. Its Success story and breaking down the reason WHY?
Prepared By
Name -Abhishek Bhaduri
Email ID - abhishekbhaduri.mit@gmail.com
Country - India

2. A little more about Netflix….
Employees Market Capitalisation Operating
Countries
Years of
Operations
115,000+ ~227bn USD 200+ 20+
Largest world movie house yet owns no cinemas

3. Market Capitalisation over the years and understand why?
Inflection points to
understand the
following
● Steep increase
of 80 billion
wealth addition
in 2020 alone.
● High growth in
2017-18 by
driving highly
platformised
services.
● Steady growth
between
2010-15 as
rivals
Blockbuster
ceased
operations in
2010.

4. Reasons for Success - 1) Ability to drive adoption by being Customer
first
1997
Founding
Starts and launches a service for
Unlimited DVD rentals for a fixed
price per month. The market was
dominated by Blockbuster which
worked on a fixed price per movie.
Streaming and Pivot
Transitioned from DVD shipments
to online programming. Faster
bandwidth and greater download
speeds made this new service
feasible.
“Watch Now
2007
Focus on Content
Creation
Launched self content with series
House of Cards and directly held
competition with HBO. Started
building a strong Tech Team too.
2013
Growing with the digital
wave
Provides Free content, added 26
million paid new subscribers in the
first two quarters of 2020. The
company had added 28 million
subscribers overall in 2019.
2020
7.5 million 40 million 180 millionsubscribers

5. Reasons for Success - 2) Focus on creating hyper-personalised
experiences
Core Reccomendation engine and its evolution
● User reviews to content based match
● Curated personalized suggestions to users basis -
a. interactions of user genre
b. Interactions of other users of similar genre
c. Information about titles - Actor, release year etc
● Categorizes and tags each show or movie to establish
over 75,000 unique micro-genres to classify its content
library.
Users Infrastructure
● Has built proprietary Open Connect
content delivery network (OCDN), which
exchanges traffic directly with internet
service providers (ISPs) to deliver content.
● Uses Amazon (AWS) for IT and delivery and
provides direct ownership to Engg Teams
for coding, testing and deployment for
highly scalable and robust solutions
● Has built a multi-tenant, highly scalable and
platformised Technology Infrastructure
layer

6. Reasons for Success - 3) Following the principle Talent leads Strategy
(and vice versa)
Created a 126 slide deck to contextually explain
the depth of every “Aspect of Culture” .
Every aspect is tied back to people and their
development.
The Original Powerpoint Presentation has
been viewed over 20 million times as of
2020 on Slideshare.

7. Summary
● Embrace Change faster than anybody else does.
○ Netflix constantly adapted to changing Customer needs through
the years.
○ It consistently pivoted from DVDs to web and then to Content
Delivery Based Networks to stream self generated content.
● Always build and continue innovating for the Customer
○ Netflix built effective streaming services for efficient viewing.
○ They continue to focus on hyper personalised experiences with
categories, lists and more.
● Value people beyond scope and comprehension. Demonstrate the
same with examples
What worked for Netflix resulting in consistent subscriber growth?

8. Appendix
References
● https://money.cnn.com/2016/01/06/media/netflix-global-launch-countries/
● https://www.thestreet.com/technology/history-of-netflix-15091518
● https://www.nytimes.com/article/best-tv-shows-movies-netflix.html
● https://www.businessinsider.in/entertainment/What-Netflix-looked-like-when-it-first-started-out-and-how-its-changed-over-the-years/articl
eshow/51982458.cms
● https://www.hackingnetflix.com/2007/12/how-would-you-r.html
● https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/info-tech/netflix-adds-over-10-million-subscribers-in-q2-2020/article32110508.ece
● https://interestingengineering.com/the-fascinating-history-of-netflix
● https://crucibleleadership.com/2019/09/adapt-or-die-how-netflix-took-down-blockbuster/#:~:text=Netflix%20would%20run%20Blockbuste
r's%20brand,saw%20Netflix%20as%20a%20threat.&text=Five%20years%20later%20in%202010%2C%20Blockbuster%20filed%20for%
20bankruptcy.
● https://variety.com/2019/digital/news/netflix-look-behind-curtain-1203169528/
● https://digital.hbs.edu/platform-rctom/submission/netflix-behind-the-scenes/
● https://research.netflix.com/articles
● https://digital.hbs.edu/platform-digit/submission/the-origin-of-netflixs-success/
● https://hbr.org/2014/01/how-netflix-reinvented-hr
● https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fuOs6nJSjY
● https://www.bloombergquint.com/technology/what-s-in-reed-hastings-s-new-book-a-blueprint-for-how-he-conquered-hollywood