HBO Now has 800000 paying subscribers since April launch

“I wouldn’t say only 800,000 HBO Now subs”, Mr. Plepler said, in a rejoinder to an analyst who placed significant emphasis on the word “only”.

The figure was revealed by HBO CEO Richard Plepler in a conference call following the release of parent Time Warner Inc.’s quarterly earnings results.

Now, the streaming service, has about 800,000 paying subscribers.

But Wall Street analysts wondered whether that customer number was low, given the enormous popularity of Netflix, which has more than 40 million subscribers in the U.S. One analyst asked whether HBO was considering cutting its $14.99-a-month price for the service to make it more competitive with Netflix and Hulu.

The CEO rejected the idea that this indicates a weak start for the 10-month-old service, however, saying that the company is “just getting started”.

Cord-cutters have pushed networks to embrace online streaming and many of them have either linked up with existing services or launched their own standalone services. In 2015, HBO and Cinemax added 2.7 million domestic subscribers, including the subscribers who signed up for HBO Now. Moreover, HBO Now has yet to make its way to Playstation and Xbox consoles, which Mr. Plepler said account for 20% of all usage of the HBO Go on-demand app.

“While HBO Now’s success may undermine $5 billion of steady affiliate fees, Time Warner said that cannibalization has been minimal, with less than 1 percent of subscribers leaving for Now”, Ranganathan and Sweeney wrote in a note January 12.

While I think HBO Now is a great idea, it may take time for the service to grow along with the number of cord cutters.

Plepler also argued that 800,000 isn’t bad for a service that went live on Apple TV last spring and wasn’t available on other platforms until last summer.

HBO is encouraging cable and satellite companies to market HBO Now as they see fit, Mr. Pepler said. In 2016, HBO will premiere shows from John Stewart, Bill Simmons, Vice Daily and returning seasons of Last Week Tonight With John Oliver, all of which Plepler said should do well on the service.