Netflix announced agreements with five consumer-electronics companies -- Panasonic, Sanyo, Sharp, Toshiba and Funai, which distributes the Philips, Magnavox, Sylvania and Emerson brands in the U.S. -- that will introduce devices that can access the Netflix Internet streaming service later this year.
Each company will introduce Netflix-ready Blu-ray Disc players or TVs, but none of the manufacturers provided details on availability.
"We look forward to adding even more partners this year, and we expect instant streaming of movies from Netflix to be available on more than 100 different partner products in 2010," Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said in announcing the partnerships here at the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show.
Netflix, which has more than 11 million subscribers, already provides the Internet video streaming feature through broadband-connected devices from LG Electronics, Samsung, Sony, Best Buy's Insignia brand, Roku and TiVo. In addition, the Internet video service is available on Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3 game consoles.
On Wednesday, Netflix said it has agreed to delay offering Warner Bros. DVD and Blu-ray releases for 28 days after initial retail release, while in return Netflix will receive an expanded number of Warner titles available to be streamed instantly to TVs and computers. Specific terms of the deal were not disclosed.
