Shonda Rhimes Signs Multi-year Deal With Netflix

Disney (NYSE: DIS) may have fired the first shot last week, but Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX) is fighting back. The Wall Street Journal and Variety are reporting that Netflix has entered an exclusive multi-year deal with Shonda Rhimes' Shondaland, the production powerhouse that has delivered How to Get Away With Murder, Scandal, and Grey's Anatomy to Disney's ABC.

Terms of the deal haven't been disclosed, but Rhimes was earning an estimates $10 million a year at ABC according to Variety. The Netflix deal likely includes financial incentives to offset the syndication potential Rhimes was generating on traditional television.

It may just be a coincidence that Disney announced last week that it would be pulling most of its content from Netflix by 2019 to launch its own branded streaming platform. Netflix is just arming itself with Hollywood hit factories, and it knows better than anyone how well its audiences have taken to Shondaland's ABC shows currently available on the world's leading premium digital video service. However, the timing of the two events sound like shots fired from both camps, a pity since the two companies were working so well together.

Source: Fool.com