Up for sale Hulu: Now with more than 1 million paying subscribers
YouTube rival and popular online video service, Hulu, now has over one million paying subscribers, chief executive Jason Kilar said on Wednesday.
Hulu's earlier forecast estimated that the company would reach the milestone by the end of the year. He confirmed that it had reached the one million paying subscriber mark "at the end of this summer".
Since Hulu rolled out a subscription tier late last year, the company has been moving from strength to strength, adding more content partners from Hollywood studios to television partners. CEO Kilar said that the company would pull in over $500 million in revenue alone this year, investing in $375 million or more in additional content.
The company started by offering content from its owners News Corporation, Walt Disney Co. and NBC Universal. Kilar said that it wants to work with more providers, saying he is "cautiously optimistic that we will work with everyone over time".
Programmers have been reluctant to make deals with Hulu, with concerns that it could undercut existing relationships with pay-TV distributors.
Put up for sale earlier this year, it sparked rumours of offers from Google through to Apple, both of which offer television services through Google TV and YouTube and the iTunes Store respectively.
Disney chief executive Bob Iger said earlier this year that the owners were "fully committed" to selling Hulu, though this position will unlikely change despite the milestone and revenue the company continues to generate.
Critics, however, say that the plan to sell Hulu is unwise, as the owners should hold onto the major distribution channel they have with the company, instead of selling it off to rivals and competitors, like Amazon, Apple or Google.
Hulu is currently up for sale for $2 billion.
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