Netflix reaches Caribbean, Latin American countries
updated 11:35 am EDT, Mon September 5, 2011
Netflix expands outside of North America
Netflix on Monday formally grew beyond North America with launches in the rest of the Americas and the Caribbean. Starting Monday with Brazil, a total of 11 Central and South American countries are getting the streaming version of the service over the course of the next week, culminating in complete coverage of both areas. In most cases, the prices will be equivalent to the $8 per month of the US service.
Expansion should go beyond the Americas in January, through Spain.
The choice of these areas first is both helped by access to some of the same content as Canada and the US but also by their developments as TV markets. Many countries, such as Brazil, are still dominated by traditional TV and movie rentals with services like Apple's iTunes relatively absent. Netflix is one of the lowest-priced Internet video services available and may be more reachable by a public whose median income is typically lower than in North America.
Netflix is quickly turning into one of the larger digital video services, even with its limited regional reach. In the US, it currently has an estimated 64 percent of Internet video, according to NPD data.
