If there’s a Disney or PIXAR film you want to watch on Netflix streaming you have just about a year and a half to do so. The House of Mouse announced plans today to withdraw their content from the popular streaming platform at some point in 2019. Content released by the two studios would exclusive to the new service after its launch.
The news comes out of Disney’s quarterly earnings report with company CEO Bob Iger stating that they are looking at launching their own Disney branded streaming service where all of the Disney and PIXAR material would reside. Iger indicated that it had not yet been decided if the Star Wars films from Disney subsidiary Lucasfilm or the superhero films of Marvel Studios would be available on their new platform as well.
But Disney product won’t becoming exclusive to their new service. Disney is part owner in the Hulu streaming service and the multiyear deal that has put some of the studios’ older films on that platform will remain in place.
But the Disney-based streaming app won’t be the only online service that they are looking to launch. The company also announced it had acquired another 42% of BAMTech, streaming technology company owned by Major League Baseball. Previously, Disney owned a 33% share of that company. With their new 75% ownership in the company, Disney is looking to use BAMTech to help launch an online component for cable sports outlet ESPN, which they also own. It would not surprise me that as BAMTech develops the ESPN platform they would also be building the Disney-branded service.