Bloomberg Businessweek

service for everyone—even consumers who didn’t subscribe

to cable or satellite TV. As Plepler put it, “There are 80 million

homes that do not have HBO, and we will use all means at our

disposal to go after them.”

The development of a direct-to-consumer product, which

would eventually be named HBO Now (HBO Go would continue

to serve paying cable and satellite customers), was under way

in Seattle. But Bewkes’s announcement accelerated the time-

line. Again, creating a technology platform would be expen-

sive, mostly because doing so required disciplined, talented,

and well-managed people working with unity of purpose—

which fairly described the opposite of Time Warner culture.

Former colleagues say Plepler and Berkes spoke different lan-

guages. Plepler was fluent in the vernacular of Hollywood;

Berkes was more of a quant. Multiple sources say the rela-

tionship frayed. (Berkes declined to comment.)

HBO executives started considering outside help. Shelley

Brindle, an executive vice president on HBO’s domestic dis-

tribution and marketing team, had recently attended Google

Zeitgeist, a conference in Scottsdale, Ariz. There she’d met

Kenny Gersh, an executive with MLB Advanced Media, a

Major League Baseball limited partnership that had become

expert in streaming high-profile TV events. As it turned out,

the same Sunday night in April when HBO Go melted down

during theGame of Thronespremiere, MLB Advanced Media

had successfully streamed World Wrestling Entertainment

Inc.’s biggest event of the year,WrestleMania. In November,

Plepler made the switch.

A month later, news broke that HBO was yanking the plug

on its internal direct-to-consumer streaming product and out-

sourcing the work to MLB Advanced Media. Berkes resigned.

n March 2015, Plepler introduced HBO Now at an

Apple Inc. press conference in San Francisco. For three

months, the app would be available exclusively on Apple

devices. TheGame of Thronesseason premiere went off with-

out a hitch in April. By February 2016, about 800,000 sub-

scribers were paying $14.99 a month for HBO Now. Finally, a

reign of stability took root.

It lasted about a year. With the market growing quickly,

MLB Advanced Media spun off its streaming division to form

a separate company called BamTech. Over the summer, Walt

Disney Co. acquired a 33 percent stake for $1 billion. Suddenly,

the digital future of Time Warner’s prized network depended

on a service controlled by a chief rival.

Enter House Telco. In October 2016, AT&T bid $85.4 billion

for Time Warner. The telecom wanted to diversify its business

to outmaneuver rivals Verizon Communications Inc. and Sprint

Corp. And AT&T execs believed Time Warner’s entertainment

assets, led by HBO, could help it take on Netflix. But first the

company would have to move HBO off Disney’s property.

For many months, HBO waited while the offer navigated

regulatory shoals. The whole time, the role of CTO remained

vacant. In summer 2018 the network closed out its deal

with BamTech and repa-

triated its streaming ser-

vice. These days, Netflix’s

technology can make

HBO’s apps look like por-

tals to the Dark Ages. In

“Bandersnatch,” a recent

specialepisode ofBlack

Mirror, Netflix watchers

could tap on their screen to alter the narrative.

After years of experimentation, HBO still doesn’t have

much control over a key aspect of the direct-to-consumer

streaming experience—the consumer. “We believe HBO Now

has over 8 million subscribers today, however, the over-

whelming majority are ... via Amazon Prime, Hulu, etc., with a

small fraction of subscribers truly direct-to-consumer,” writes

Rich Greenfield, an analyst with BTIG LLC.

On March 4, AT&T named Robert Greenblatt, former

head of entertainment at Showtime and NBC, the chairman

of WarnerMedia Entertainment. In that role, Greenblatt will

oversee the company’s direct-to-consumer streaming ser-

vice. Whenever that product is ready, it will enter a brutally

competitive market. Two other major conglomerates, Disney

and Comcast Corp., plan to release similar services to take on

Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu. In an interview with Bloomberg

News, Greenblatt said many details about how HBO and the

other Turner and Warner Bros. assets would be combined into

the mix had yet to be settled—the same challenge the network

was working on in 2013. “It won’t be easy to coordinate it all,”

he says.  —With Gerry Smith and Lucas Shaw

51

Netflix makes

HBO’s apps look

like portals to

the Dark Ages

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DATA: HBO, IMDB. CONTINUING SERIES ARE THOSE LISTED AS AIRING CURRENTLY, AIRING SOON, OR RENEWED ON HBO.COM