Disney Shares More Info on its Netflix-Like Streaming Service

Investors are very interested in Walt Disney's (NYSE: DIS) plans for its upcoming streaming service -- so much so that Disney stock initially traded about 3% lower following the company's fourth-quarter earnings release last week but then reversed when Disney executives offered up new details about the service during its earnings call. Indeed, the stock ended up rising about 2% after investors heard more information about Disney's direct-to-consumer product plans.

So, what exactly did Disney say? Here's a look at the company's latest details on its streaming plans.

Disney is well positioned

Before delving into the more nitty-gritty new details on the service, Disney CEO Bob Iger put the importance of Disney's plans to evolve amid a new media landscape front and center in the company's fiscal fourth-quarter earnings press release.

Disney has said it has plans for two streaming services -- an ESPN-branded multi-sport video service that will launch in 2018 and a Disney-branded streaming service that will launch "in the latter part of 2019."

The initial offering

Disney's ESPN-branded sports service, of course, will launch first. The service will feature a fully redesigned app that will include additional sports coverage beyond existing network content that users can get access to on an authenticated basis. It will also feature sports scores and highlights. Making it clear that the content is incremental, Disney now says it will call the service ESPN Plus.

Iger said the company's Disney-branded service will initially stream "the latest Disney, Pixar, Marvel and Star Wars feature films." In addition, Iger said it will produce around four or five feature films a year exclusively for the service.

Based on the recent popularity of Disney's films, exclusive features could prove to be an extremely compelling value proposition to many consumers. Consider the essentially unblemished track record of Marvel films, with the last 12 in a row crossing $500 million at the global box office. Or there's the average global box office of $665 million for Disney's animated movies since its acquisition of Pixar.

To catch rival Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX), Disney will need to ramp up its content schedule for the service quickly. Netflix has similarly ramped up its content spending with each subsequent year. The company currently has $17 billion worth of content commitments over the next several years and plans to spend $7 to $8 billion on content on a profit-and-loss basis in 2018. Netflix's budgets for content spending in 2016 and 2017 were $5 billion and $6 billion, respectively.

Disney will launch original TV shows

Beyond making available its growing library of feature films and some exclusive movies on its direct-to-consumer service, Disney will roll out original TV shows and shorts on the service, Iger explained in the fourth-quarter earnings call (via a Reuters transcript).

While Iger wasn't clear on whether some of these original series will be available in the initial rollout, he said the service will ultimately offer "thousands of hours of Disney film and TV library product."

Disney's content schedule is aggressive

Iger assured investors that Disney is going all-in on the service, opting to launch it with a bang.

The service will be priced "substantially below" Netflix

Iger said Disney plans to price its direct-to-consumer product "substantially below where Netflix is." While he admitted this will partly reflect the company's smaller content library, it also represents an aggressive effort to attract as many subscribers as possible.

But investors shouldn't expect the service to stay at whatever low price it launches at. Disney wants to follow Netflix's model of raising its prices over the years as its content library increases.

"[T]hat will give us an opportunity to grow in volume and to have the pricing over time, reflect the added volume as this product ages," Iger said.

Disney's update on its streaming services confirms its commitment to bringing to market compelling direct-to-consumer offerings.

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Daniel Sparks owns shares of Walt Disney. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Netflix and Walt Disney. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.