Hulu and Apple were reportedly also interested in acquiring Friends -- Netflix deal could be a preview of The Office streaming rights

Recode

Recode reports Hulu and Apple helped push the push the value of Friends reruns to the "around" $100-million mark that Netflix was willing to pay (or $70 million to $80 milllion, according to The Hollywood Reporter). Recode's Peter Kafka explains AT&T's new deal that will give Netflix the rights to Friends for 2019, but gives WarnerMedia's upcoming streaming service the chance to stream the show afterwards. "In part that’s because there’s some chicken-and-egg going on here," says Kafka. "Friends is a valuable asset, so WarnerMedia would naturally want that asset in its own service instead of someone else’s... unless that WarnerMedia service ends up being a flop, in which case stashing Friends there means it is a wasted asset. So here’s the hedge WarnerMedia has ended up with: After 2019, WarnerMedia has the ability to pull Friends from Netflix altogether, and keep the show as an exclusive. Or it can let Netflix stream the show as well, at a discount of about 25 percent. Which means there’s a scenario where WarnerMedia can get another $75 million a year from Netflix and still use the show as a key part of its own streaming service." Kafka says this could be a preview of what happens to The Office rerun rights when they expire on Netflix because Comcast is considering its own streaming service.