Disney CEO Bob Iger Confirms Mouse House Will License Content To Netflix, But Feels No Need To “Chase Bucks” By Sharing “Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars” Content

Disney CEO Bob Iger surprised many by announcing the company has been licensing content to Netflix, a streamer many would consider one of its top competitors, and plans to continue doing so for the foreseeable future.

The Disney exec explained their reasoning during a Q4 earnings call Wednesday (Nov. 8), saying, per Indiewire, “We’ve actually been licensing content to Netflix, and are going to continue too. We’re actually in discussion with them now about some opportunities, but I wouldn’t expect that we will license our core brands to them.”

Iger explained that their “core brands” are what set Disney+ apart from other streamers. So, Marvel fans shouldn’t expect to see Loki streaming on Netflix any time soon.

“Those are real — obviously — competitive advantages for us and and differentiators. Disney, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars, for instance are all doing very, very well on our platform,” he said. “And I don’t see why, just to basically to chase bucks, we should [license them out] when they are really really important building blocks to the current and future of our streaming business.”

Warner Bros. Discovery recently made a similar move, with Insecure, Six Feet Under, and Band of Brothers joining Netflix’s content library. Unlike Disney, however, Warner Bros. is willingly sharing content from one of its own “core brands,” with multiple DC titles such as Zack Snyder’s Justice League and The Batman set to join the streamer in December.

All of this is part of Iger’s plan to make Disney+ profitable by the end of 2024, a goal that he expressed during the earnings call.

Disney recently announced that it will be merging Disney+ with Hulu into a single app experience. According to Iger, a beta version of the app will launch next month but it will officially go live in spring 2024.

“We found that where we bundle, we lower churn,” Iger said during the call. “And again, these are steps that are all taken to make [streaming] a great business.”

The merger is expected to go into full effect after Disney fully acquires Comcast’s one-third stake in Hulu.

“Imagine the opportunities a combined Disney+, Hulu and ESPN streaming experience can offer us as a company and consumers,” Iger pondered, per The Hollywood Reporter.