Netflix and CW Strike Licensing Deal

Netflix and CW Strike Licensing Deal. On Thursday, the CBS Corp. and Warner Bros. Television Group’s CW confirmed a four-year licensing deal with Netflix. This will allow Netflix to stream previous seasons of several of the CW’s series like, Ringer, Hart of Dixie, The Secret Circle, The Vampire Diaries, Gossip Girl, 90210, One Tree Hill, and Nikita. The programming will include the eight dramas that are featured on the CW’s fall 2011 schedule. Time Warner has struck its biggest deal with an online service to license it’s online content. The specific details of the deal were not disclosed, however, CNBC reports that the deal was worth $1 billion dollars. Jeffrey L. Bewkes, the chief executive office at Time Warner, eventually “warmed-up” to Netflix streaming business and set an established method for monetizing the streaming content not only with Netflix–but with the other online streaming services (i.e. Hulu Plus and Amazon Prime).

“Our rules included bypassing the quick and easy money,” Mr. Bewkes said in an interview on Thursday. “We established a strategy to responsibly work with Netflix.”

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The CW television network was established in ’06 by CBS and Warner Bros., and is the largest producer of episodic series on television.  The shows will be available to watch via the Netflix streaming dashboard beginning on October 15, 2011; with the previous seasons of Supernatural and 90210 are set to begin in January. To include, all of the CW broadcast season to premiere the fall of 2012.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter, The New York Times