Business Blooper: The Billion Dollar Bet Nobody Watched

Sometimes the idea is right and everything else is wrong.On April 6, 2020, Quibi launched as the most well-funded streaming debut in history, backed by $1.75 billion from Disney, NBCUniversal, WarnerMedia, Sony, MGM, Goldman Sachs, and JPMorgan Chase, with original programming from Jennifer Lopez, Reese Witherspoon, and Chrissy Teigen among others. Founded by Jeffrey Katzenberg, the former chairman of Walt Disney Studios and co-founder of DreamWorks Animation, and led by CEO Meg Whitman, the platform offered premium short-form video in episodes of five to ten minutes built exclusively for mobile phones. It projected seven million subscribers in its first year. It reached approximately 500,000. On October 21, 2020, six months and fifteen days after launch, Katzenberg called investors to say Quibi was shutting down. The content library was later sold to Roku for less than $100 million.bsnsBloopers is part of the bsnsDAILYpodcasts lineup from bsnsBasics, hosted by Ron Trucks.Find more at www.bsnsDAILYpodcasts.com