Apple has about $76.2 billion in cash and securities on hand, which puts it in a good position to make acquisitions with very little effect on its bottom line. That said, the Cupertino company may be about to make a move, and is in early talks to acquire Hulu, sources tell Bloomberg.
It’s no secret that Hulu is shopping itself ar
Look at it this way. Save for CBS, Hulu is the major networks’ go-to online spot to distribute their content: after all, Walt Disney, News Corp, and Comcast-NBC Universal all own a portion of the site. Any suitor would gain the rights to a significant amount of content in one fell swoop.
Sources say the deal would include a five-year extension of programming rights, with two of those years being exclusive. Apple would have a use for this, and it would obviously turn Apple TV from a “hobby” into a serious part of its business overnight. Its other products, from iPhone to iPad and even the Mac platform would all benefit.
Analysts say that Hulu would likely be worth about $2 billion, chump change to Apple considering what it could mean for their bu
There’s no deal yet, and such an acquisition would be by far Apple’s biggest. The company seems to prefer buying smaller companies with its largest the $400 million acquisition of Steve Jobs’ NeXT Software back in 1996.
Another consideration for Apple is that it would need a long-term vision for Hulu. The site currently generates about $500 million in revenue, meaning it would take four years at least to recoup the purchase price from Hulu alone. However, consider the increased hardware sale as a result of the deal and the benefits to Apple products, and that may take much less time.
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