David Zaslav, the new head of Warner Bros. Discovery, is willing to restructure the company to reduce costs and become the most competitive entertainment conglomerate possible. And that happens, apparently, due to the dismantling of HBO Max’s plans to expand into new territories.
According to Television Business International, Warner has decided to cancel the launch of its streaming platform in France, expected in 2023, as well as in Iceland, Turkey, Greece and the Baltic countries, where it was also announced.. In the case of France, where they had already made major contracts for their executive, they reported that they will soon launch another different streaming platform with a Warner Bros. and Discovery + catalog. But it won’t be HBO Max, a brand that was a big bet from WarnerMedia’s previous leadership. The company issued the following statement: “We will not launch new markets in the future. We will not aggressively pursue subscriber growth as long as we work towards our main goal, which is to bring our products together.”referring to Discovery + and Warner Bros. In principle, Discovery + would continue to reach new markets, such as Germany and Austria, where it landed last week.
This bombshell comes just hours after Variety revealed it Warner Bros. Discovery had also decided to cancel the production of all European original content, with the exception of France and Spain.. This means that the series, films and shows that would be created for HBO Max in the Nordic countries, Central Europe, the Netherlands and Turkey have been paralyzed and sent to the dustbin. The company is pulling out the merger between Warner and Discovery again as an excuse for this cancellation, which will result in the loss of several jobs, because “are examining current content proposals”That “their commitment to these markets hasn’t changed” and what has already begun to produce will not stop.
Spain gets rid of almost everything
The latest step taken by the company was to remove various content from the HBO Max catalog to sell the broadcast license to other networks or platforms. While Spain has come out pretty well from all of this restructuring because HBO Max has already launched in our country and will not go away, and the production of Spanish content appears to be free from cancellations, Series like ‘Foodie Love’, ‘Por H or Por B’ and ‘Nothing new’ are no longer available in the platform catalog, and are left in limbo until they find a new home. Particular is the case of ‘Por H o por B’, of which the second season has been announced. Will the first season return for the second? Will they leave the season in a drawer? All of these moves leave everything HBO Max in an unexpected limbo that we need to be aware of.
Source: E Cartelera
