Netflix said Tuesday that it would begin offering its streaming movie and TV service in Central America, South America and the Caribbean later this year, marking a major expansion of the company’s geographic footprint.
To date, Netflix has been available only in the United States and Canada. Investors have been looking for insight into the company’s international growth plans.
The expansion totals 43 countries, Netflix said in a news release. It did not specify when the service would be for sale in those countries, beyond saying “later this year.” The service will be available in Spanish, Portuguese and English.
Netflix said nothing about how it would license content in other languages. Licensing issues are thorny for services like Netflix because the rights to films and TV shows are sometimes carved up on a country-by-country basis.
The Netflix chief executive, Reed Hastings, and chief financial officer, David Wells, acknowledged in a letter to shareholders in January that potential growth outside the United States was a fundamental question for the company going forward.
“Each country represents a new market, where we have global process knowledge and technology, but no brand or content until we invest locally,” the two men wrote in the letter.
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