Netflix continues to add customers in Canada, and beef up its content offering.
The U.S. video streaming giant, releasing its fourth quarter results Wednesday, now lumps Canada into its expanding international division, which includes Latin America.
During the latest quarter, Netflix signed up 380,000 customers in Canada and Latin America, taking its combined international customer base to 1.86 million.
Without breaking out the Canadian subscribers, Netflix Canada is estimated to be serving around 1.2 million customers currently.
Netflix, in a statement to investors, said offering fresh movies and TV shows during the fourth quarter was helping build its Canadian base.
The addition of lots of compelling new shows and movies both drove increased hours viewed per member, and member acquisition during the quarter,” Netflix said.
The new programming came from existing output deals, and new deals, without Netflix specifying with whom.
On the TV side, Netflix Canada has added new series from Fox, Sony, and AMC, while on the film side Netflix Canada added titles like Black Swan, True Grit, and The Chronicles of Narnia.
Higher programming costs are denting Netflix Canada’s margins, as the video streaming giant continues building north of the border.
“The market opportunity in Canada is exciting enough that we continue to invest in the content library, meaning that we’ll run at roughly break even for two quarters, and we expect to return to a positive contribution profit starting in Q3 of this year, two years after our initial launch,” Netflix told investors.
“Our plan after that is to grow our contribution margin as we continue to grow our membership,” the U.S. company added.