Bidding War: Has Google Proposed an Alternative Plan for Hulu Acquisition?

  • As the bidding war for Hulu continues, Financial Times reports that Yahoo, Amazon and Dish Network are all expected to offer near 2 billion dollars for the company, its subscription service and the rights to exclusive content for at least two years.
  • However, Google is rumored to have proposed a significantly higher bid for an acquisition proposal on a larger scale. Details have not been released, but some speculate that Google may offer a couple billion dollars more in exchange for more content for a longer period of time. It is not clear if the Google proposal includes a longer deal for content or possibly something else — or if Hulu would even be interested in a new plan.
  • According to The Wall Street Journal: “Since that’s not what Hulu’s owners have put on the table, ‘normally we would have thrown people out if they’d said that,’ says an executive familiar with the sales process. But Google ‘indicated that there’s enough money’ involved so that Hulu’s owners are at least thinking about continuing the discussion.
  • The video site would fit nicely with Google’s YouTube, which has struggled in landing the type of long-form premium content that Hulu owns. And if rumors are accurate, Google is willing to pay.
  • But would the content owners agree to terms with Google, which is already the largest video website worldwide, when they were earlier holdouts on Google TV?

2 Comments

  1. I guess that’s why they call it a bidding war…glad to see that it’s paying off and people are paying up for quality content (if not for Hulu itself).

  2. I guess that’s why they call it a bidding war…glad to see that it’s paying off and people are paying up for quality content (if not for Hulu itself).

Leave a comment

You must be logged in to post a comment.