Peacock boss Matt Strauss has structures to conserve you streaming

Matt also deal withs the global streaming platestablish that Peacock and other services at NBCU run on, and I wanted to understand that big tech allotment is generating the charitable of economies of scale that reassociate pay off over time — stuff that tech companies leank about all the time, but media companies have had to lget. 

One leang I reassociate wanted to talk to Matt about was how Peacock regulated the Olympics this year — it felt enjoy leangs reassociate clicked for the platestablish in Paris over the summer, and the idea that all the coverage could be served up in multiple separateent establishats on insist and inhabit reassociate toiled. It turns out that a lot of these ideas have been bretriumphg for a prolonged time — for a decade or more in some cases. 

There’s a lot in this one — tech, media, sports, and culture, all at once. It’s quite a ride.

Our normal disclocertain before we begin — NBCU is an allotor in The Verge’s parent company, Vox Media, but they have no regulate over our novelsroom, and I remain free to insist NFL games in 4K HDR of their executives on my show whenever I want. You’re on the hook now, Matt.

Okay, Matt Strauss, head of honest-to-user at NBCUniversal. Here we go.

This transcript has been weightlessly edited for length and clarity.

Matt Strauss, you are the chairman of honest-to-user at NBCUniversal. Welcome to Decoder.

Thank you, Nilay. It’s excellent to be here.

That is a very establishal title. It sounds enjoy you sit in a leather chair in a boardroom and equitable sort of rehire edicts. What it uncomfervents to me is that you deal with Peacock. Is that reassociate the scope of it?

It’s a little bit expansiveer than that. To give you a little bit of background, I actuassociate have equitable commemorated my 20-year anniversary at Comcast, and so I’ve been at the company for quite a prolonged time. And when I came to Comcast, I actuassociate came there as cable was transitioning from analog to digital, and it gave way to the two-way uniteivity that ultimately built leangs enjoy on-insist. On-insist technology is someleang I’ve been very enthusiastic about my entire nurtureer and was reassociate intensifyed on how I built that out for Comcast and spent quite a number of years doing that.

We ultimately started the X1 platestablish, which was Comcast’s IP set-top box, becaemploy we authenticized that the future was on-insist that was going to give people instant gratification, and we needed a platestablish to permit people ultimate regulate, that they could guide all these on-insist choices, and X1 became the platestablish where we did that. And it reassociate was ahead of its time becaemploy it aggregated inhabit and on-insist and DVR and even apps and made them all reassociate seamless for users, including the ability to guide them with your voice with the voice far, which was before even Siri and Alexa — enjoy we were experimenting with voice.

I leank as my nurtureer there charitable of grew and I took on more of the role of deal withing the dwellntial services at Comcast, which participated video and expansiveprohibitd and phone, I got a call one day to come to NBC, which clearly is a subsidiary of Comcast, and I got a call from Steve Burke, who at the time was the CEO, and he had asked if I would come there to help them create a streaming service and get it to labelet, and I got that call on a Thursday, and on Monday, I showed up in New York City with my suitcase, and I was ready to go. And what’s very normal inside of big companies in my experience is that when you’re trying to create someleang novel, it’s normal to almost incubate it. You charitable of create resources. You put a little bit of a fence around it becaemploy you don’t want the day-to-day activity necessarily interfering with the ambition of trying to create a novel business, and Peacock was the same inside of NBC.

What I authenticized punctual on was that there’s lots of other businesses wilean NBC that actuassociate are very pelevateary and can help get us more scale, can help de-hazard the execution and the ambition we had with Peacock, for example. NBC owns Fandango, which is one of the bigst ticketing companies. They own Voodoo, which is now called Fandango at Home, which has a catalog of 250,000 titles for digital buy and rental. They own Rotten Tomatoes, which is certainly understandn for movie and TV appraises. They also — everyone’s understandn with NBC and a lot of the cable nettoils that we have in the United States, but NBC allots their nettoils in almost every country around the world.

We recognized that if we could aggregate all of these businesses under one portfolio, it actuassociate could give us even more economies of scale, and that’s what we begined to do. And so the umbrella of honest-to-users, Peacock is certainly a big piece of it, but all these other businesses — the global businesses and these other digital businesses — now sit under this D2C umbrella, and they each have their own individual P&Ls, but in the aggregate, they accomplish 100 million employrs, they create billions of dollars of revenue, and they also… they’re useable in over 70 countries around the world. I leank that that is the portfolio that I’m now managing. How we then leverage that portfolio is someleang that I’ve been trying to create out over the last restricted years around aget, trying to create one product team, one technology team, one decision sciences research team, etc., to give us charitable of these caccesss of excellence inside of NBC as we persist to roll out our digital structures for honest-to-user.

You’re on Decoder, so I’m absolutely going to ask you about how all of that is structured and how all of those individual P&Ls fight for resources. But I want to equitable get one step back and intensify on the transition you alludeed from Comcast to NBC to honest-to-user.

In the TV world, we’re expansively going from a place where big cable companies enjoy Comcast or Spectrum or wdisenjoyver had big regional physical infrastructure monopolies. You had these organic monopolies becaemploy you had wires in the ground going to everyone’s hoemploys. You were the distributor, the video providers would come to you and you would resell those services, and that was a pretty excellent business for everyone.

Now we’re at a place where there’s multiple ways to get programming over the internet, whether it’s wireless, whether it’s fiber in the ground, whether it’s still the cable nettoil, whether it’s other establishs of expansiveprohibitd enjoy Starjoin, and the distributors don’t have as much power over the suppliers becaemploy the suppliers can get to users in lots of separateent ways. That’s the transition that you’re alludeing, and it has reassociate disturbed the whole industry. How do you see Peacock fitting into this at the end? Is it going to be as excellent of a business as the cable business was once upon a time? Becaemploy it senses enjoy everyone is searching for a business that excellent.

There’s no ask that the cable business is a excellent business and persists to be a excellent business. I leank to answer the ask, you almost need to see at it thraw the lens of the user. And what I’ve lgeted is there reassociate are separateent cohorts of how people use video, how they subscribe to video.

So, for example, the cable customer tends to watch a lot of TV. The mediocre user watches about five hours a day; if you subscribe to cable, you typicassociate watch that much, if not more. And there’s a lot of profit of having cable becaemploy, as I alludeed, if you have the X1 platestablish, there’s a sadviseedy of equitable having all the choices in one place. It toils with 99.99 percent reliability. In many cases, people are also subscribing to the bundle, so they’re getting video, but then they’re also getting internet, and in some cases, they’re getting their wireless. And even though people tend to say they enjoy a la carte, bundling has a lot of virtue becaemploy the more you get, the better the price. People who subscribe to cable and saalertite today, it’s not that they’re not alerted of other choices — they’re paying in some cases, for that convenience in that reliability. They also tend to over index in subscribing to streaming services. It’s not one or the other. In many cases, you’re seeing that customer buying both. That’s one part of the labelet.

You have another part of the labelet, which might be more price comfervent, maybe does not use as much video. In some cases, they might watch video, but they might be spending more time on social media or video gaming or how else they’re occupying their time, and they enjoy the flexibility of being able to subscribe to a subset of services. And in many ways, that’s what honest-to-user is adviseing.

There is a Venn diagram, though, here, where as a media company, you want to cast a expansive enough net where you’re providing a appreciate proposition for one segment, which is enjoy the satisfyed carnivore but, at the same time, adviseing the voluntaryity, and in some cases, with honest-to-user, but in many cases, there’s an overlap between the two. When you see at it as a portfolio, which is reassociate how we regulate the business in NBC, it’s not honest-to-user sits outside of the expansivecast and the liproximate and the cable nettoils; it’s actuassociate all one group, and we regulate it as a portfolio. And there’s examples where that comes to life enjoy the Olympics, but I leank that we are charitable of seeing at it in totality and that it’s about giving customers choice and chooseions, and that’s how we see ourselves prolonging. If pay-TV deteriorates and cord cutting prolongs, we still want to service the customers who have paid TV, but at the same time, we recognize that the prolongth over the next foreseeable future is going to persist to come from honest-to-user.

The last time I was a Comcast customer was 15 years ago. I inhabitd in Chicago, and everyone I knovel was a Comcast customer. That was the choice in my createing and most of the neighborhoods that my friends inhabitd in. We all also got internet from Comcast becaemploy of what you’re describing — the bundle. There was not another leang; it was equitable the easiest next leang to do.

When you portray honest-to-user, that’s another distribution method, right? You’re going literassociate honestly to the user and charging them money and then giving them services honestly, and you regulate the customer relationship. Is that the part that’s going to prolong, versus the experience I had when I was a Comcast customer and I would watch NBC 5 in Chicago, but Comcast owned the relationship with me?

I leank when you charitable of study the pay-TV ecosystem and the trajectory of pay-TV, I leank it’s constantly been declining year over year, and I don’t leank anybody reassociate understands at what point does it begin to flatten out? But I do suppose that there’s always going to be a equitablely big group of people who are willing to pay a premium for cable for all the reasons that I said before. And so I leank that’s still going to be a very, very big part of the TV watching and TV hoemployhgreaters watching. But yes, I uncomfervent, honest-to-user is where we’re reassociate projecting the prolongth to come from.

I actuassociate leank that there’s a lot of signs of what I’ve lgeted in the cable business that I see happening in the honest-to-user business that, in some ways, it’s going to be, I leank, back to the future. And what I uncomfervent by that is that people who maybe did cut the cord, part of the reasonablee I suppose was becaemploy they thought they were going to save money by going and equitable getting some streaming services. And to a certain extent, that was real for some period of time, but it was very foreseeable that the cost of satisfyed hasn’t gone down, the cost of sports rights haven’t gone down. It was inevitable that prices of streaming services were going to have to incrrelieve. And we’ve seen that as an industry over the past 18 to 24 months, where streaming services have persistd to get their rates up in an effort to drive more profitability. By the way, we’re not take awayd from that. I uncomfervent, we took a price incrrelieve over the summer. I leank that that was a very foreseeable outcome.

The other foreseeable outcome, from my point of watch, is what I said earlier, which is people watch more video than they reassociate understand. If you see at the Nielsen numbers, the amount of time that people spend watching video has been equitablely constant over the past decade. If you cut the cord and you sign up for a streaming service, you’re improbable going to get your video calories as a user from one service. What happens is you subscribe to two, three, and now the mediocre user is subscribing to four or five services.

You get these two leangs together, where I’m subscribing now to four or five services, the rates are continuing to go up. In some cases, you may be asking yourself: Wait, I might be paying more and possibly getting less than what I got when I subscribed to cable. And I leank that these are the ingredients in the labeletplace that is driving the labelet to bundling. And we had talked about this, I had talked about this five years ago that we’re probable going to see an explosion of streaming and honest-to-user, only to then discover it almost reaggregate itself under a novel bundle. And I leank there’s clearly a lot of evidence over the last two years where that’s exactly what’s been happening.

And I leank that, so aget, in many ways, it doesn’t alter the fact that you’re going to still have people who subscribe to cable or streaming or both, but I leank that honest-to-user is going to be a very presentant component, but I leank increasingly honest-to-user, and honest-to-user as part of a bundling create, is going to probable be how many people over time are subscribing to these separateent services, which, aget, is mockingassociate back to where everyleang begined with cable television.

Are you seeing the prolongth in the bundling, and are you able to protect the customer relationship as the bundles prolong? I’m leanking particularassociate of my customer relationship with your competitor, Max, which is somehow to this day still settled by my AT&T account becaemploy I’m an AT&T subscriber, and I don’t leank they reaccumulateed that they spun the company out. So, I still have Max thraw AT&T, and it’s actuassociate quite confusing, right? Becaemploy I can’t adequitable that account, and wdisenjoyver, I’m equitable going to depart it alone. Are you seeing that sort of leang perestablish out as you bundle, as you go out to labelet, that someone else is owning the customer for you?

It’s a excellent ask. We might be a little bit distinct becaemploy we actuassociate do not have that much bundling. The presentantity of our subscriber base is honest-to-user, and we have been very regulated in how we’ve tried to prolong the subscriber base.

Peacock started in 2020, and at the time, the labelet was reassociate intensifyed on on-insist, scripted dramas, binge-watching, and ad-free. Most services were chasing that segment of the labelet. We came to labelet procrastinateed, if we’re being truthful about it, but one of the profits of coming to a labelet procrastinateed is you could appraise the white space and where you see opportunity. We suppose the opportunity for us was to position Peacock in the premium ad-helped space and not equitable charitable of intensify on premium scripted dramas and movies and on-insist, even though that is a piece of the programming strategy, but it was also about inhabit sports and inhabit novels and unscripted programming and multicultural programming.

Playing to the strengths of what we do as a company, as a expansivecast company, which was to center a expansive hoemployhgreater demodetailed. And the strategy there was that if we anchored ourselves in that place, then we’re not honestly competing with other streamers — we’re more complementary. It was about endness and, in some ways, being enjoy the best of cable TV for a relatively affordable price. We also supposed that the future was not equitable going to be on-insist, even though on-insist is a core piece of the way we use television. But that liproximate and inhabit, which a lot of people, four years ago, were saying was dead, that was equitable nonsense. That’s why when we started Peacock, we wanted to have both liproximate nettoils. We started with dozens of liproximate channels. We started with a library of 80,000 hours, or we’ve prolongn the library to over 80,000 hours of programming.

We were also very intentional about it being ad-helped becaemploy a dual revenue stream from our point of watch was better than a individual revenue stream. And this is also core contendncy for what we do at NBC with having a very strong ad sales team and presentant relationships with separateent publicizers. And we went to labelet with five minutes of ads per hour, which, aget, was a very disputed leang to do at the time, but that’s given us an get becaemploy it’s also permited us to intensify on how do we create on the advertising beyond 15 and 30 second spots becaemploy it’s been core to our DNA from the commencening? And the only reason I’m giving you all this context is that when we built the service with that intent, it reassociate was separateent in the labelet. The huge presentantity of people who signed up for Peacock signed up honestly, with the exception of Comcast. We did do a bundling deal with Comcast, and they currently do wholesale Peacock with certain of their packages enjoy high-end gig expansiveprohibitd subscribers, but the overwhelming presentantity of our sub base is honest-to-user.

Now, to answer your ask, though, as the labelet shifts more and more toward bundling, I do see that becoming an increasingly bigr portion of our subscriber base. And aget, taking the history lesson from what we understand about bundling, the one leang that arguably has always held the bundle together has been sports. And sports, understanding this, coming from that side of the business, if you reaccumulate, when we started Peacock, it was presumed to be around the Tokyo Olympics. Live sports was always fundamental to our strategy, and we’ve been aggregating inhabit sports and sports rights equitablely constantly since we’ve started Peacock, with authentic purpose and intention, understanding that not only is sports going to be a driver of acquisition, which has shown to be real for us, but that sports is going to be an presentant component that if the labelet does shift to bundling, that not only will we firmify our place in that bundle. But equassociate presentant, if not more presentant, is that you get the right wholesale economics around how you’re positioned in that bundle.

And so we sense enjoy we’re in a reassociate excellent position based on the trajectory that we’re on, but if the labelet does shift more toward bundling, we also sense enjoy we’re well positioned to be participated in that charitable of packaging. But I don’t leank it’s going to get away from honest-to-user. I equitable leank, for us, it’s going to persist to augment the subscriber base that we currently have.

Can I equitable unpack the phrase “wholesale economics” in a sweightlessly more Machiavellian way? What you’re describing is: you’re going to have the sports that everybody wants, so when the bundles go out to labelet, you will accuse a higher rate or get a higher percentage of the rate people pay inside the bundle, right? This is classicassociate ESPN and the cable companies. ESPN got the highest carriage rate of any of the cable companies. Right? This is what you’re describing?

Well, I’m describing price appreciate, and there’s a high appreciate on sports, and that’s clearly manifesting itself when you equitable see at sports rights and the price that sports rights are going for in the labelet. Essentiassociate, yes, I uncomfervent, yes to your ask, that we see ourselves… I uncomfervent, if you see at Peacock equitable as an example, we have more inhabit sports than any other streaming service. When you see at the NFL, the Premier League, Big 10, the Olympics, clearly the NBA, that’s coming to Peacock procrastinateedr next year. And over the course of a year, we have some inhabit sports 300 of 365 days. We didn’t get there by accident. We got there thraw authentic intention. We’ve had a very constant strategy and vision from the commencening. And I leank what you’re equitable seeing is us executing agetst that strategy.

We would say internassociate enjoy, see, this is not a sprint — it’s a marathon. Maybe at a sprinter’s pace becaemploy clearly the labelet’s moving very rapidly, but we’re blessed to be part of a much expansiveer diversified company at Comcast, with a greater regulatement team that supposes in our vision, in our strategy. And that’s permited us to not do leangs enjoy chase low appreciate subs or do wholesale bundling deals without the right economic relationships. And I leank it’s positioned us in a reassociate, reassociate excellent way going forward becaemploy we don’t sense enjoy we have to do leangs artificiassociate equitable to prolong our sub base. We want to prolong subs at the right RPU (revenue per subscriber), at the right level of participatement, and create a subscriber base in the right way. And that’s essentiassociate what we’ve been doing, and we haven’t wavered from that strategy or that vision from the commencening.

You portrayd the separateent segments of the audience, right? There are some people who still have traditional MVPD subscriptions, and equitable, they’ve got a saalertite box or a cable box or wdisenjoyver, and there’s other people who are watching TikTok all day. I would segment them separateently. I leank you’ve got greaterer customers and juvenileerer customers, and the juvenileerer customers will almost certainly never sign up for a traditional multichannel cable bundle type leang, right? When you leank about that split, that has a timeline on it, right? You’re going to miss greaterer customers at some rate and hopefilledy get juvenileerer customers at a rapider rate. Are those lines going to sync up on time? Do you see the prolongth in the juvenileerer customer offsetting the deteriorate in the greaterer customer?

Becaemploy when you talk about the deteriorate of pay-TV, traditional pay-TV, it’s getting rapider is what everybody alerts me.

The deteriorate in pay-TV isn’t… I uncomfervent, this may sound cimpolite — it’s not equitable becaemploy greaterer people are passing away. I uncomfervent, some of it is people at all ages are making decisions where they might sense enjoy it’s more precious where they want to equitable cut the cord, so to speak, and get streaming services, and you could be at any age to do that. But to answer your more expansive ask, yes. I uncomfervent, that is essentiassociate the strategy, which is why Peacock exists wilean NBCUniversal — we see the pay-TV business still being a very excellent business. It still is a very profitable business for our company. And we’ve built reassociate strong brands in the pay-TV ecosystem that streaming is a way for us to charitable of drive more prolongth and offset that deteriorate and eventuassociate become the expansiveer prolongth engine for the company.

But as I alludeed before, I leank sometimes, it’s clarifyed that legacy nettoils are somehow enjoy dinosaurs and that that’s not reassociate where people are spending a lot of time. I see it very, very separateently. I see it as a strength. When you have a expansivecast nettoil and you could do someleang enjoy the Olympics and you’re averaging over 30 million watchers a day, that actuassociate becomes a huge promotional vehicle for you to also drive alertedness and audience for your streaming service. When you have nettoils enjoy Bravo with reassociate presentant fandoms and you can tap into that fandom on a streaming service by starting, by making some of that satisfyed useable to cord cutters, it creates a little bit of an infinity loop where liproximate nettoils and pay-TV can drive audience to streaming and alertedness for streaming. And vice versa — streaming can drive people back to liproximate.

Another example of this would be a show enjoy Yellowstone. Not everybody may be alerted, but we have the exclusive rights to stream Yellowstone on Peacock. When we licensed Yellowstone, it was not the number one show on television, which is part of the reason why we got the rights to it becaemploy we took a bet that we thought it was a reassociate excellent show. But that show was on Paramount Nettoil, which is a cable nettoil on various tiers of cable. It’s not even a fundamental cable nettoil. And what happened there, I leank equitablely foreseeably becaemploy it is an excellent show, is that people were discovering it on streaming becaemploy we are the exclusive home for it. They were then catching up as the show bettered in its seasons, and then they were tuning back in to watch the novel season, in some cases on Paramount Nettoil, and then that was driving people back to Peacock where maybe they wanted to watch it from the commencening or they wanted to catch up. And it became this reassociate fascinating infinity loop.

This is the same leang that happened with Breaking Bad when it was useable on AMC and another streaming service, or Mad Men. So, I see at it very separateently. I see at it as this is a strength and, if we can figure out ways to persist programming these separateent platestablishs, that they can persist to drive the audiences in a way that becomes a separateentiator and a prolongth engine for us. And aget, it goes back to why we’ve orderly ourselves in the way that we have, which is to reassociate leank of it as a portfolio.

Two leangs. One, I appreciate that you won’t name your competitors — very excellent. You’re talking about Netflix. Two, I could talk to you for the rest of our time about Yellowstone and whether the Dutton family is rich or not, which is presentantly confusing as that show goes on. I equitable want to be clear. They have a helicchooseer, but then they need to sell the… It’s very confusing.

They can’t pay for the gas.

It’s so confusing. It’s a fantastic show. I reassociate could equitable talk about Yellowstone for the rest of the time. 

You’ve talked a lot about being the place where the customer goes every day, uncovering the app every day, having the relationship. A lot of what you’re talking about is being the interface for television, but Peacock has to run on devices from Apple and Roku and Google and whoever else, on Samsung TVs. All of those companies, they want a piece of your ad sales; they want a piece of your subscription revenue. What are those relationships enjoy? Are they in your way? Are they someleang that you’re equitable handling? Are they not on your mind?

Well, no. I leank, see, when you’re seeing at deinhabitring a streaming service, we clearly need to be useable on every individual platestablish and device, but the presentantity of video consumption is still on the television, and so these distributor relationships are reassociate presentant. I leank we have reassociate excellent relationships with all the separateent partners. You even saw that in the Olympics. Like Roku, for example, built a amazing interface to back the Olympics. Apple and Amazon did a reassociate fantastic job promoting. I’m not trying to name-drop any particular platestablish, but I leank we’ve got the right business relationship where they’re incentivized to sell Peacock and participate in our prolongth, and we profit also from the placement.

What I uncomferventt when I said frequency and habituation is, I leank of it as, how frequently, Nilay, do you employ your phone? And I could alert you the mediocre user employs their phone or sees at their phone two to 300 times a day, and you probably never turn off your phone. I understand for me, it’s the first leang I see at in the morning, it’s the last leang I see at at night. I even employ it as my alarm clock. I never turn off my phone. Now, leank about your TV. Well, you probably turn on your TV when you want to watch it, and you maybe do that a couple of times a day. And then what do you do? You turn it off.

I’m seeing at it separateently and saying, what do you need to do where someone never wants to turn off their TV and they want to uncover up our app every individual day? That, to me, is the ambition I’m challenging my team to leank thraw. That sways decisions we’re making around, that’s a very separateent active around how you program and regulate a service, if that’s your ambition. But that’s where I leank we need to go as a streaming platestablish. And the shutst example might be a show enjoy Love Island, which was a huge hit for us over the summer. That show was on five days a week, and so that clearly needd you, if you were watching that show, to tune in five days a week. And that is part of the habituation and frequency that I was referring to that I don’t leank is reassociate converseed a lot when people are evaluating streaming services.

Let me ask you some of the Decoder asks now becaemploy I leank we’ve led up to them pretty honestly. NBCUniversal is a big company — you’ve got a expansivecast division, you’ve got a sports division. These are greater, well-understandn groups inside the company. How is your group orderly wilean NBCUniversal?

Right now, we are all part of the same group, which tells into Mark Lazarus. And Mark Lazarus deal withs all TV and streaming. Initiassociate, it was enjoy Peacock was enjoy its own split entity, end-to-end — own programming, own labeleting, own help services enjoy HR and lhorrible, etc. Everyleang was charitable of insuprocrastinateedd, and we have been methodicassociate fractureing down those silos.

We reassociate suppose the opportunity is to come around more splitd services. As I alludeed, we now have one programming division apass the entire portfolio, which tells into Donna Langley, who also deal withs our movie studio. Now when we’re making programming decisions for expansivecast, cable, or streaming, you’ve got one group that’s deal withing that strategy and that vision, which, aget, I leank helps us as we create decisions around satisfyed that could potentiassociate perestablish apass multiple platestablishs in separateent triumphdows.

We toil very, very shutly with the labeleting department of NBC, and as you probably acunderstandledged, enjoy NBC backs Peacock and locks up Peacock whenever they’re promoting their primetime show. We toil very shutly, the Peacock labeleting team toils very shutly with the NBC labeleting team. And we have someleang which we call Symphony, where we all give a certain amount of conceiveory that we employ to pass back apass all of our platestablishs. If you’re going to see a show enjoy Fight Night, which is a novel show on Peacock from Will Packer, you’re going to see that backd on NBC, on our cable nettoils, on Peacock, becaemploy of how we’re partnering on Symphony. And we’ve done someleang very analogous, enjoy, we’ve verifyated decision sciences and research, which is reassociate the caccess of gravity around all the analytics and the telling. So, aget, you have one team that’s seeing at that hocatalogicassociate apass liproximate and apass streaming.

We have one product team and one technology team that’s managing a individual platestablish. We haven’t reassociate talked about this accessiblely, but maybe it’s equitable worth equitable spending one minute on. What we’re trying to effectuate here is NBC, we built as part of Peacock, a equitablely big team of people that are createing out our streaming platestablish, both on the product side and on the tech and on the engineering side. Our sister company, Sky, which functions in the UK, Italy, and Germany predominantly, they have a streaming service that you may be understandn with called NOW TV. And these were two separateent groups with equitablely big teams that were createing separateent platestablishs, in some cases analogous features. And we recognized that there was an opportunity to verifyate it all under one team, which we did, and it’s called the Global Streaming Platestablish Group, which sits inside of D2C. I understand I’m throtriumphg a lot of acronyms at you.

This is what Decoder is all about. I’m ready for it.

GSP is now made up of thousands of people that tell into my team that are all apass the world. They’re in the UK, they’re in Lisbon, they’re in Prague, they’re in New York. We’ve built one hocatalogic team, and that platestablish is what powers Peacock, but this same platestablish is what powers a unitet venture that we have in Eastrict and Central Europe with Paramount, called SkyShowtime. It’s the GSP platestablish that we’ve built as one company. It also powers the platestablish that we started in over 50 countries in Africa, thraw a venture that we have with a distributor called Multi-Choice, that’s also the GSP platestablish. And next year, we are going to actuassociate migrate NOW TV onto this one GSP platestablish, and so this has unlocked tremendous efficiencies apass the company for us.

It also, I leank, has been a huge motivator for the people that toil on this becaemploy now they’re toiling on one platestablish and it can incrrelieve the velocity where they can create leangs once and not have to necessarily have teams competing agetst each other. And in many ways, this is what positioned us so well, in my opinion, for leangs enjoy the exclusive NFL perestablishoff game in January and the exclusive NFL game that we had a restricted weeks ago in Brazil with the Eagles and the Packers. It’s also what positioned us so well as a platestablish, in my opinion, for the Paris Olympics. And it’s becaemploy we’ve had this maniacal intensify on how do we get more scale, more efficiency with a authentic promisement to, enjoy, we want streaming to toil enjoy TV.

And what I uncomfervent by that is, you don’t leank about it when you turn on the TV, generassociate. It’s a little bit enjoy electricity. You don’t leank about electricity unless there’s a bdeficiencyout; then you leank about electricity, but the electricity is what powers everyleang in your hoemploy. Everyleang that you’re using in your hoemploy is probable getting powered by electricity. And that was, in a way, the ambition that we had with the platestablish, which is, can we create the platestablish so constant, so scalable, that procrastinateedncy buffering, crashes if too many people are using it, out of sync audio with video, all the leangs that have afflictiond streaming for years. Let’s do everyleang we can to equitable get that right. And if we could do that in a big way, then that gives us permission then to drive innovation.

The last two years, we have been reassociate organizing ourselves in that way, createing a platestablish, becaemploy inhabitstreaming especiassociate, if you haven’t acunderstandledged, is very challenging. But we’ve been reassociate promiseted to that vision, and I leank I’m self-presentant of the team and what we have accomplished becaemploy it permited us to then do someleang enjoy the Paris Olympics, which we sense reassociate excellent about, becaemploy all of the leangs that we presentd, we’ve wanted to present for years but we didn’t suppose we had permission to do that until we got what I equitable called the fundamentals, right? And to me, the fundamentals are: noleang matters from an conceiveive standpoint if the platestablish doesn’t toil. I sense enjoy we’ve been very regulated and intensifyed on doing that, and we’ve structured ourselves around that ambition over the last couple of years.

Does that product team tell to you? Is that part of your group?

It is, yeah. The product impact teams tell to me.

I don’t leank we’ve ever disshutd it accessiblely, but it’s in the thousands. We’ve got thousands of people. It has prolongn ponderably over the last restricted years. And aget, I leank as we’ve built this platestablish and exhibitd the capabilities, it’s actuassociate permited me to partner with other parts of our company to shift more and more resources toward the global streaming platestablish team. This has reassociate been the tip of the spear in how we’re continuing to create out all of our technology on streaming going forward. And we toil very shutly, of course, with Comcast cable, who has a very big team as well, but they have been more intensifyed on uniteed TVs and uniteed TV devices. There’s enjoy a complementary nature to how we toil together, but our intensify has been, as you can envision, mostly on streaming video.

One of the leangs that’s reassociate fascinating about what you’re describing is you have a core platestablish, and then the platestablish is transmited thraw various products, right? Peacock, the NOW service, what you’re doing in Africa. Do you ever discover yourself equitable seeing at the Trello board litigating people’s priorities? Like the Peacock team wants this feature, but the NOW team wants another feature, and the platestablish has to create a decision about what goes first? Becaemploy every tech company sees enjoy that.

Yeah. Well, the answer is, of course, yes, I uncomfervent, which is a very classic charitable of dispute that you have when you become a splitd service as a platestablish. And there’s ways around that, though. I uncomfervent, we do carve out a certain amount of capacity to the separateent services that we’re helping.

So, for example, in some cases, there’s normalality, enjoy SkyShowtime has advertising. Well, they actuassociate profited becaemploy we had already started advertising on Peacock, and so when they want to start advertising in Poland, that’s a relatively basic leang for us equitable to turn on becaemploy it’s already been built. But in Africa, equitable as an example, the watching behavior is much more oriented toward mobile watching becaemploy they don’t have the expansiveprohibitd elevate that we have in countries enjoy the United States. The presentantity of streaming happens on mobile devices equitable becaemploy of the prohibitdwidth constraints. And there’s also separateent payment structures becaemploy most people don’t always have the ability to pay by the month, and so they need to maybe pay by the day, or they, in some cases, have to go to retail environments where they buy vouchers to pay. We have to create capabilities that are more distinct to that labelet.

You have to be able to arbitrage certain capacity depending on the priorities, but there’s a profit, which is when you create these capabilities, we’re createing it once, and so now we have that capability. If we ever wanted to present that functionality in other labelets, it’s not enjoy we’re createing it once and it’s throwaway toil. We can actuassociate leverage it and profit it apass, and it profits other parts of the platestablish.

It is a charitable of a balancing act, but I sense enjoy, generassociate, Peacock is certainly the caccess of where we’re intensifying the huge presentantity of our resources, given the priority, the presentance of it. And I would say the presentantity of how we’re using the platestablish in other countries is writeing behind Peacock and the Peacock roadmap, with the exceptions of some of the leangs that I equitable alludeed that are more distinct to those labelets.

A lot of companies that create big costly core infrastructure enjoy you’re describing, once they’ve built it, they want to sell it, right? They want to go monetize it, white label it, give it to other people, get some more appreciate out of the allotment. Do you have enough scale with your own products and your own partnerships to help the ongoing allotment here, or would you go white label it to one of your partners?

No, we have no ambition of white labeling it. We’re being very surgical, I would say, and methodical on how we’re leanking of this. So, in the examples that I’ve given, we have partnerships. The SkyShowtime venture is a 50/50 venture. The venture in Africa that I alludeed, we have an equity sget in that venture, and clearly, we own Sky as a expansiveer Comcast company.

I leank that our ambition is not to create a white label platestablish. The profit of what I’m describing is that as we’ve charitable of created these partnerships, which has permited me to get more scale; it also subsidizes the enbigment for Peacock. By strategicassociate licensing our platestablish in the ways that I’ve portrayd, it’s conveying in actuassociate another revenue stream to me that I’m then able to employ to include more resources to speed up the enbigment. And aget, all of these pieces is what’s positioned us in a way to permit us to do some of the big leangs that we’ve been able to do over the last couple of years, especiassociate around inhabit programming.

You’ve portrayd the core platestablish as a splitd service a restricted times. You’ve portrayd how Peacock went from being inside of an incubator at NBCUniversal, to now being part of the expansiveer portfolio. Do you leank of what you’re doing as the sort of tip of the spear to get novel customers, juvenileerer customers? Do you leank, eventuassociate, you’ll become the caccess of gravity instead of a splitd service, or is it always equitable going to be part of the portfolio?

I alludeed earlier that when I came to NBC from Comcast, Steve Burke called me, and I’ve understandn Steve for a prolonged time. He actuassociate employd me at Comcast when he was the pdwellnt of Comcast, and it was charitable of filled circle when he asked me to then come to NBC when he was the CEO of NBC. But he said someleang to me on the phone which resonated, which is he said, “Peacock’s our future.” And I clarifyed that not equitable that it’s the future revenue prolongth or prolongth for subscribers. I clarifyed it as it’s enjoy this is how we could create a novel culture, and that’s what excited me.

Part of what I’m reassociate self-presentant about that we’ve done inside of NBC since I’ve been there is not only set uped Peacock as the rapidest prolonging streamer, and our last getings, I leank you understand, we’re at 33 million subscribers and continuing to show bottom line prolongth. I’m also self-presentant of the culture that we’ve built inside of NBC, which, to me, is equassociate presentant. And I’ve probably spent of a huge presentantity of my time reassociate on how we create that culture in a way that I suppose is going to position us for success. And It’s around collaboration; it’s around communication, transparency.

Remember, Peacock was born in covid. I was literassociate in my hoemploy createing a novel service that I had to structure with hundreds of other people that were not in the same room with me. And that forced a lot of communication, a lot of transparency, a lot of suppose, a lot of people senseing ownership. And I have been doing everyleang I can with the help of others to nurture that sense of culture and that has begined to spread into other parts of the company. I leank from that esteem, yes, I do leank that Peacock is in many ways trying to alter the company in some ways from the inside out, by also being polite of the expertise of other parts of the company inside NBC.

But I do leank over time, our future is very much anchored on streaming and Peacock, and that is, but the separateence is everyone inside the company owns a piece of that. It’s not one group anymore. It’s now novels, sports, delightment. Every individual part of our company has their DNA in some way uniteed back to Peacock. And I leank that is our superpower: how do we harness that power inside the company to so everybody senses ownership of it? And I leank that’s been probably the biggest alteration I’ve seen over the past four years since I’ve been at the company.

This guides right into the other Decoder ask. You’re clearly a alter agent inside of NBC, right? You’re going around all these groups, getting them to participate. When you were on the cable side, I’m assuming you had a separateent attitude toward making alter. How do you create decisions now? What’s your summarizetoil, and how has it alterd?

I actuassociate didn’t have a separateent perspective when I was at cable, only becaemploy over 10 years ago, I was part of a group that was nested inside of Comcast cable, which was called Comcast Interactive Media, and we were there to disturb the cable business, and that’s exactly what we did. That being a alter agent is actuassociate someleang I enhappiness, but being a alter agent in the right way I leank is also presentant, which is thraw collaboration, thraw challenging people but doing it, I leank, in a polite way and in more of an inalertectual way and getting people to buy in. I reassociate enhappiness that aspect of the roles that I’ve perestablished at Comcast and the roles that I’ve perestablished at NBC.

I’m not certain if this is answering your ask honestly, but I leank it’s our goal wilean NBC is we want to get Peacock to scale. We have subscriber centers that we want to get to; we certainly want to get to profitability.

We are not profitable now, but it’s alloting. The way I see at it, and this is charitable of someleang that’s so fascinating becaemploy, and I equitable neglect it to be truthful with you, but you’ll see press articles where it’s enjoy, “Peacock is losing money.” I uncomfervent, we are a beginup business. I’ve never seen a beginup… I uncomfervent, did Amazon create money instantly? I leank that you’ve got to have a much prolongeder-term watch here, where I say no, we are alloting in a business, and so what you’re seeing for when you’re alloting in a novel business is: Are you prolonging? Are you hitting your KPIs and the metrics? Are you achieving the prolonged-range structure objectives? And the answer to those are, yes, we’re actuassociate go beyonding those objectives, which only gives us confidence that we’re on the right path. We have a prolonged-range structure, and we are executing agetst it.

So, getting Peacock to scale, getting Peacock to profitability, but aget, doing it in a way inside the expansiveer portfolio is reassociate where we’re intensifying a lot of our resources and our efforts, and we sense reassociate excellent that we’re on the right path.

How do you create decisions inside of that summarizetoil?

I leank that in order to accomplish what I equitable said, if you’re a subscription business, you need to say, “Okay, what’s going to drive acquisition, which is an presentant ingredient to a subscription service? What’s going to drive retention and participatement? What is going to drive frequency?” Which is someleang that’s not reassociate talked a lot about with streaming services, but it’s someleang that I’m very intensifyed on, which is, how do you actuassociate alter the paradigm where you want people to go into your app every individual day? And aget, that’s not the way people typicassociate leank of streaming becaemploy if it’s all on-insist or it’s all binge-watching, you’re essentiassociate alerting the user it’s there whenever you want it. There’s no advisency to it, and we want to actuassociate get people to uncover up our app every individual day becaemploy that equitable gives you more at-bats, so to speak, to try to drive them into other parts of the service, which then drives more participatement, more monetization, better retention.

When you see at it thraw that lens, it drives a lot of our decision-making. So, our programming decisions around — it’s enjoy a mutual fund. You need a equilibrium. It can’t be one excessive or the other. If you’re too intensifyed on acquisition, then it’s a leaky bucket. You’ll get a lot of people to sign up for your service, but then you’ll equitable miss them becaemploy you don’t have enough satisfyed to participate and conserve them. And then vice versa, if you’ve got a lot of satisfyed that drives participatement, that’s not going to get you to scale becaemploy you need the… we are managing it almost enjoy, I leank of it as enjoy a mutual fund.

We have a budget. We have a programming budget. We have a labeleting budget. We have a P&L inside of NBCUniversal that’s promiseted to Peacock, even though we are part of the expansiveer portfolio, and so we’re making decisions around: what do we need to do in order to accomplish those goals? But I sense enjoy we got rocket fuel becaemploy I have the includeed profit of tapping into this expansiveer portfolio that could materiassociate include more labeleting appreciate or, reaccumulate, we’re the home for all the Universal movies. When Twisters or Wicked goes into theaters, we’re the next stop after the premium transactional triumphdow. We’re the exclusive home for all the next day NBC programming. We’re the exclusive home for the Bravo programming. We’re—

Can I actuassociate ask you about that? Becaemploy I’ve been very asking about this. That strategy has been tried by some of your bigr competitors. Disney notably tried this. Max has tried this in separateent ways. And one of the rehires there is, your studio doesn’t get to go to labelet and say, “How much do you want to pay for Twisters in the first triumphdow after the pay triumphdow?” and get bids from Netflix and Max in Peacock. Do you have to bid? Do you triumph? How are those economics accounted for?

You’ve probably heard this, and this is someleang that’s funny becaemploy a lot of people don’t suppose this, but some of the most satisfyedious negotiations happen internassociate.

Of course. Families fight the challengingest.

Yeah, and sometimes, it’s counterperceptive to people, but the uninalertigentinutive answer is, yes. I uncomfervent, see, we have profit participants. We have to conserve negotiations at arm’s length, and in many cases, our satisfyed and the price of our satisfyed is being set by the labelet. And we don’t exclusively license every individual piece of satisfyed on Peacock. I alludeed our movies. Our movies, we are the first triumphdow, but then there’s a pay 1A, and then there’s a pay 1B. There are other third parties that our teams license their satisfyed to, and so it set upes labelet actives that we then need to debate agetst. So, we are paying our equitable split when it comes to programming. And even in the case of the NBC next-day programming, that satisfyed was useable before on another streaming service, and so there was a set appreciate that was already ascribed to it that we essentiassociate had to step into if we then wanted to migrate that satisfyed onto Peacock, which we did.

My only point was as a company, we made the decision that we wanted Peacock to be the home for our satisfyed, which uncomferventt that we were going to also have to put our money where our mouth is, so to speak, and create the allotment to permit us to claw back that programming. And we’ve been doing that, but by doing that, it also persists to tether us honestly into other parts of the company in a very likeable way. Becaemploy, aget, we’re all toiling together to persist to accomplish these accumulateive goals around Peacock.

I do enjoy that we conserve treating Netflix enjoy Vgreateremort, and we won’t say its name. It’s very excellent.

I have tremendous esteem for them, and I don’t leank a whole lot about other streaming services. And so this isn’t… I’m not trying to be disparaging in any way. 

You are not our first executive who will name the competitors.

We equitable had Greg [Peters, Netflix co-CEO] on the show. Netflix is a accessible company. We can see at their economics. They’re profitable, they’re doing well. We can see also inside of the business. They’re essentiassociate alloting in inexpensiveer programming, right? Lots of inhabit comedy exceptionals, lots of fact shows. They’re not doing the big premium dramas the way that they employd to be doing.

You’ve got the big catalog from NBC. Does that give you the ability to say, “Okay, we’re going to create the money aget. Friends is prolonged since paid for. That is purify margin for Peacock. We are going to allot in paying more for Universal’s catalog becaemploy that’ll conserve people here”?

We’re perestablishing to our strengths. And one of our strengths —  and, to be truthful, I did not appreciate this when I first came to NBC — is equitable how much people adore the NBC satisfyed. And I’m not equitable talking about the current programming. I’m talking about the presentant catalog of satisfyed that NBC has. We have 80,000 hours of programming on Peacock on-insist, and that has been a huge get. To have a show enjoy The Office, Parks and Rec, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, to be able to have the Dick Wolf catalog of Law and Orders and Chicagos, to have every season of [Saturday Night Live]. I uncomfervent, these are leangs that, aget, perestablish to our strengths that we knovel drives a lot of participatement. That’s been a profit.

We never subscribe to the fact that streaming has to be equitable scripted dramas. That is a big piece of it, for certain. Scripted dramas do drive acquisition and help with brand enbigment, and you can almost probably leank of a show that you could ascribe to a streaming service as, charitable of enjoy, you put it on the map, so to speak, as an inflection point. So, that was always part of the calculus for us as well, but we always knovel and supposed that streaming could be so much more. Unscripted, inhabit sports, inhabit novels, that’s been part of Peacock from day one. Arguably, it’s the hunter becoming the hunted, where you’re seeing other streaming services, I would argue, are moving more into our space than we’re moving into their space, including the fact that we’ve been very promiseted from the commencening to an ad model, which we supposed was the big opportunity for us.

And, becaemploy we knovel that eyeballs were going to persist to shift more to streaming for all the reasons that you said earlier. And we also knovel that the presentantity of streaming happens on the TV, even though most people thought it happened on the phone, but the TV is enjoy the novel TV, and you’re now seeing every streaming service for the most part, starting an ad tier. The labelet is evolving, but it’s evolving, I leank, in a very foreseeable way. But we reassociate have been very constant with our vision and strategy, and I leank that’s actuassociate given us an get becaemploy it’s permited us disjoinal years to allot in inhabit programming and allot in advertising as part of our platestablish DNA, which equitable puts us in a very separateent place in our trajectory, contrastd possibly to some other services.

Let’s talk about sports and the Olympics and the NFL a little bit, equitable to wrap up. The Olympics were a big hit on Peacock. The app was ready, the features were incredible. I’m asking: there was a lot of stuff going on in Peacock. You had the Ggreater Zone. You had inhabit highweightlesss. There’s an AI Al Michaels situation. There were reperestablishs. There’s multiple channels.

How did you unite the product and programming teams there? Was that a individual team? Did the Olympics team from NBC come and say, “We’re going to do the Ggreater Zone — get it ready”? How did that toil?

Remember, from a product and technology perspective, it’s this GSP team, this platestablish that I alludeed, so it’s the same team. And since we’re all part of the same group, we literassociate sit right next to the NBC Sports team and next to the NBC Entertainment team, and so we toil hand-in-gadore with these separateent teams.

When we brainstorm ideas and we recognize where we want to go and where we see the opportunity, and I leank that we charitable of recognized with Paris punctual on, the sgets were high. Right? I uncomfervent, we’re coming out of covid for the last two Olympics where there were asks about the cultural relevancy of the Olympics going forward. I leank, if I’m being very truthful, I don’t suppose Peacock reassociate satisfyed the promise of the Olympics for streamers and for cord cutters with Beijing and with Tokyo for a variety of reasons. But I leank that there were authentic asks about whether or not we could reassociate deinhabitr the experience that we knovel we needed to deinhabitr. The sgets were high, and we get it so gravely. It’s a privilege to toil on the Olympics. That’s reassociate how a lot of us sense, and it’s a tremendous responsibility.

We thought we were ready to surpascend and charm and present features that we suppose potentiassociate could alter the way people experience sports. And what I don’t leank people appreciate, and this, aget, is equitable the profit of being a part of a bigger company, is that Paris has been 10 years in the making.

So, for example, when you went on to Peacock and you watched a reperestablish — maybe you missed an event and you wanted to watch Simone Biles — making the satisfyed useable on-insist and for reperestablishs, that was first done in London 2012 at Comcast. That was the first time we made all the Olympics useable on-insist. When you saw the Ggreater Zone with Scott Hanson, which was amazing and the NBC sports team did an amazing job producing that, we actuassociate tested that, if you see, in Sochi in 2014. We tested the Ggreater Zone and that idea. When people were watching Snoop, who became the ambasgrieffulor of the Olympics, which is enjoy a surauthentic leang becaemploy he became so relatable to so many people, we tested Snoop in Tokyo in 2020, where we gave him an Olympic show on Peacock becaemploy it was too disputed to put him on NBC at the time. This has been an evolution that has gotten us to this place, but it is an example where every part of the company was firing on all cylinders.

And it also speaks to what I said earlier, where Peacock was the number one app. Peacock, we had more digital consumption on Peacock for Paris than every other Olympics united. And at the same time, though, there was always a ask of, well, is that going to cannibalize the primetime show for NBC? And that didn’t happen. The NBC primetime show had a record number of watching becaemploy people were watching on Peacock during the day, but then they wanted to see the storyalerting that NBC does so well during primetime, and that’s that infinity loop that I was referring to. It reassociate is an example of, I leank, what perestablishs to our strengths, what we do well as a company. And we were preparing for years for that moment, and we’re reassociate self-presentant of what we were able to deinhabitr.

I leank in many esteems, there’s no going back becaemploy, when you could deinhabitr that charitable of experience and you get that response, we’re now seeing at it and saying, “Well, how do we then execute that to the NBA? How do we execute that to the Premier League? How do we execute that to other types of experiences?” And this is the next frontier for streaming, from my point of watch, becaemploy right now, streaming is arguably a two-uninalertigentensional service, which is: I sign up for your service based on your satisfyed and your price. I leank the next iteration will be product. How do you begin to employ the product in a way that separateentiates the experience from one streaming service to another, where arguably now there’s more analogousity than separateences? The Olympics is an example of what I uncomfervent when I say the product can become part of the appreciate proposition of where we want to go over time.

If I were to project out in the future, I actuassociate leank the next version of where I then want to go with Peacock and with streaming is to enbig the aperture even beyond video. It goes back to what I said about time. How do you get more split of time? If five hours is the ceiling for video, how do we begin tapping into other ways that we can drive participatement on our platestablish and include more appreciate? Becaemploy it’s not a streaming platestablish — it’s an delightment platestablish. That’s the way we’re begining to leank of it. And we’ve got lots of other parts of the company that could be leaning into how do we get more split of time, but also, how do we begin to get more split of wallet?

You can envision one day, Nilay, that you subscribe to Peacock ,and not only do you get this fantastic video service, but maybe if you’re a Peacock subscriber, you get a free movie ticket to Fandango. Maybe if you’re a Peacock subscriber, you get punctual admission to Universal theme parks. Maybe given our publicizer relationships, maybe you get discounts to McDonald’s. I uncomfervent, so we are leanking very separateently, I suppose, in how we want to grow the appreciate proposition beyond equitable what it is today — anticipating where we leank we need to go as a platestablish.

You had a big influx of subscribers for the Olympics. How many of you conserveed? We’ve talked about this a lot. Have you held onto a lot of those subscribers?

We haven’t disshutd the number, but I guess one way to leank of it is: 90 percent of people who participate with sports on Peacock watch other satisfyed. So, aget, we see at sports — there’s no bigger fandom than sports. SAnd so sports, as I alludeed earlier, is a very effective tactic to drive acquisition. We’ve shown that with the NFL exclusive games and NFL standard season games. We’ve shown that, certainly, with the Olympics, but we also have such a fantastic portfolio of other programming.

The way that that’s manifesting, equitable to charitable of create on this for a second, is that when you see at someleang enjoy the perestablishoff game that we did earlier in the year, it was the most watchership participatement we’ve ever had on Peacock. But the next day after the perestablishoff game was the biggest on-insist usage day we ever had on Peacock. And one of our innovatives, Ted, the Seth MacFarlane show, was the number one innovative we ever had on Peacock. And then, The Traitors, which equitable actuassociate won the Emmy for Best Unscripted Competition Show, was the number one unscripted show on Peacock. We have the ability to bend the curve when we could get somebody who comes in for sports but employ the product in a way to participate them with other satisfyed on our platestablish. And aget, that’s the profit of having such a big catalog of programming for each individual in the home.

Sports rights are getting more and more costly over time, producing the Olympics, clearly not inexpensive. NBC can do all this becaemploy it can monetize that in disjoinal separateent ways. You have expansivecast, which is lucrative. You’ve got cable, which is still lucrative, and now have Peacock. Will Peacock ever get to a place where it can help one of these big sports rights deals all by itself?

If you see at someleang enjoy our WWE deal, which is sports delightment, all of those events employd to be pay-per-watch events, and those are now exclusively useable on Peacock. And that was a deal that we accessed into that even though we have a relationship with the WWE for USA, that was a decision that we made that was very particular to equitable Peacock.

But I actuassociate leank of it a little bit separateently. We’re not reassociate intensifyed on sports that are distinct to equitable Peacock. I leank one of the profits of being part of this bigger portfolio is we have the ability to create satisfyed enjoy sports useable on separateent platestablishs. And I leank when you see at someleang enjoy the NBA, which we’re very excited about and is clearly a very big deal for us as a company, these rights only come up every decade, and so it’s pleasant to have these rights back where they beprolonged on NBC and on Peacock. I leank part of the reason that we were able to access into that relationship is becaemploy we’re more than equitable streaming and that we have such a expansive accomplish with expansivecast and with cable. I see that as a strength, and to me, that’s someleang that I would want to persist leaning into as we appraise sports rights deals going forward.

My belief is most leagues see it the same way ‚ that they don’t necessarily want it to be restricted to equitable streaming becaemploy you still have such a big audience that’s useable on these other platestablishs, including pay television.

You’ve walked into my trap by talking about the product and talking about sports. What do I have to do to get a real 4K NFL game on Peacock? How much? I will pay you honestly.

[Laughs] Well, I don’t understand how to quite answer that.

Just say yes. In your heart, equitable say yes. You understand you want to.

I do want to, and so, yes, we have the same ambition that you do. We want to advise every event in the highest quality.

But NBC — I talked to Neal [Mohan] at YouTube, and I’m enjoy, “What’s conserveing you?” And he is enjoy, “Millions of partnerships and expansivecasters.” NBC owns the whole chain. You’ve got the expansivecast booth. You’ve got the production. You’ve got the rights honestly. You’ve got the platestablish. What’s stopping you?

I leank that we want to create certain that when we’re deinhabitring satisfyed, especiassociate satisfyed that’s simulcast apass the separateent properties. We want to deinhabitr it in the highest quality universassociate. If we’re going to deinhabitr the satisfyed in 4K on Peacock, I leank it’s also presentant that we’re able to deinhabitr it in 4K to our expansivecasted stations and to our cable and saalertite distributors. It includes a little bit of complicatedity in having that intensify. The relationships and how we approach the labelet is uncomferventingful to us, and we want to create certain that we’re doing it in a very comprehensive way for all of our partners, not equitable one platestablish.

But I’m your partner, and I want you to understand that I want 4K.

Listen, I split your ambition and your enthusiasm. We will get there. I leank we’ve shown that we’re continuing to grow the product and the platestablish. Hopefilledy, you’re seeing that as a user, and aget, the Olympics is an example.

Do you see insist for higher video quality? This is the leang that I stress about — is that people pick convenience over quality all the time, and the insist for 4K or high bit rate, it equitable isn’t there.

I leank I’m going to put back on my Comcast hat. We’ve been deinhabitring 4K, and most people don’t even understand if they have a 4K television, or they leank they’re watching in 4K and they’re watching in enjoy 720p. I don’t leank the mediocre user generassociate reassociate does understand it becaemploy it is confusing. Like, what is 4K? What’s Ultra-HD? What’s HDR? There’s a lot of labeleting rhetoric. I don’t understand if it’s being reassociate driven by the user as much as maybe a sub-segment of the user—

Our ambition is to advise the best and highest quality video and audio, so to me, that’s an presentant quality of the platestablish, and technicassociate, that is what we’re createing toward. Whether the user is necessarily asking for it or not, we want to advise them the best and highest quality, and so that is reassociate the ambition of where we’re going with Peacock. And I leank we will absolutely get there.

All right, Matt. This has been fantastic. You’ve got to come back when you have 4K football, becaemploy that’s the only leang I wanted. I did this whole conversation. I defered until the end. I want to point that out.

It was a authentic pleacertain talking to you. Thank you for having me on the show. I appreciate it.