Reed Hasting – The Man Behind Netflix

Reed hasting is the man behind Netflix and who revolutionised the way we used to entertain over selves. Netflix is a rental based media service which offers various TV shows, web series and movies to the viewers around the world.

Hasting launched this online video rental services in the year 1997 which is now popular all over the world. Reed Hastings made the success of Netflix possible because he believed that taking calculated risks is the key to entrepreneurial success.

Early Life and Education

Hasting was born on 8 October in the year 1960 to a prominent attorney family in Boston and from a very young age, he was adventurous and loves to take risks.

He used to study maths in Bowdoin College after this he served U.S. Marine Corps as he was an adventurous boy. After Marine, he joined the Peace Corps and travelled to Swaziland where he taught maths to the high school kinds.

After two years he returned home and continued his education and while he was perusing his degree he realized that he is going to be a big business leader. He started his first company which was named "Pure Software" and in 1997 it was sold to Rational Software.

Then he began to work on something which was going to revolutionised the entertainment industry with one of his friend Marc Randolph. They created Netflix which now very successful and have millions of subscribers from around the world.

Netflix Inc.

Netflix is the biggest online entertainment and production company in the world, it was founded by Reed Hasting and Marc Randolph in 1997 and it's head office is in Los Gatos, California.

They started it as a subscription-based online streaming service where a user can browse their favourite movie or TV show but later they started producing their web series which is called Netflix Originals.

Netflix has a user-base of over 148 million paid subscribers and 154 million subscribers including free trials worldwide. More than 60 million users are from the US. Services of Netflix are available around the world except Mainland China (due to local restrictions), Syria, Iran, Crimea and North Korea (due to US sanctions).

It is the member of MPA (Motion Picture Associations) and has offices in various countries like India, Japan, Brazil and South Korea. Their initial business model was included sales of DVD and rental by mail but later Hasting decided to stop DVD sales within the first year of their business and focused on DVD rental business.

In the year 2010, Netflix included streaming media along with their existing business model. In the same year, they also expanded their business in Canada, Latin America and the Caribbean and the year 2012, they began creating their content as Lilyhammer being their first series.

Since then they are very active in making new and creative web series known as "Netflix originals". In the year 2016 Netflix released an average of 126 series and movies which is way more than any other cable and network operator.

Their continuous efforts to produce new and amazing web series and to secure the rights of existing contents in more than 190 countries have given them positive results. As of 2019, Netflix is worth more than three billion.

Reed Hasting has some plans for new and creative shows in the coming years which will be appreciated by their viewers.

Netflix is now focusing on creating localised content so they can connect with the local public like they are now producing a web series in India by partnering with Red Chillies entertainment to boost their viewership in India.