Netflix Facts and Numbers

What is better with pizza than a movie? Netflix was founded in 1997 in Scotts Valley, California by Marc Randolph and Reed Hastings, who previously had worked together. Randolph was a co-founder of a computer mail order company and later was employed by Borland International as vice-president of marketing. Hastings, once a math teacher, had founded Pure Software, which he had recently sold for $700 million. Hastings invested $2.5 million in start up cash for Netflix.

The idea of Netflix came to Hastings when he was forced to pay $40 in overdue fines after returning a rented movie well past its due date.

The Netflix website was launched on August 29, 1997 with only 30 employees and 925 works available for rent and brought a more traditional, online pay-per-rental model (late fees applied). The company offers unlimited vacation time for salaried workers and allows employees to take any amount of their paychecks in stock options.

Netflix introduced the monthly subscription concept in September 1999, and then dropped the single-rental model in 2000. Since that time the company has built its reputation on the business model of flat-fee unlimited rentals without due dates, late fees, shipping and handling fees, or per title rental fees.

Netflix was offered to Blockbuster for $50 million in 2000, but Blockbuster declined.

In 2005, Netflix shipped 1 million DVDs every day.

In February 2007, the company delivered its billionth DVD and began to move away from its original core business model of mailing DVDs by introducing video-on-demand via the Internet.

By 2010, Netflix's streaming business had grown to 14 million subscribers and shifted from the fastest-growing customer of the United States Postal Service's first-class mail service to the largest source of Internet traffic in North America. In November of that year it began offering a standalone streaming service separate from DVD rentals. It launched internationally in 2011.

On January 26, 2012, the company announced it had 24.4 million US subscribers.

Disney and Marvel TV said they will provide Netflix with live action series, beginning in 2015, featuring Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Iron Fist, and Luke Cage, leading up to a miniseries about the Defenders.

Netflix signed an agreement in 2014 with a US Cable company to offer it as a channel on the TV lineup. Users can click on the channel, like any other channel, and have all the Netflix options.