Netflix, Italy, Zoom, Platow - that was Monday, September 26th, 2022

Three billion dollars in profit with around 16 billion dollars in sales in the first half of the year: Runs on

, you might think.

But the streaming giant is having a blast: the number of subscribers is declining, the stock market value has collapsed, and arch-rival

, if you add Disney sports channel

, now has more customers with 221 million subscriptions.

Netflix, just celebrated as an uncatchable streaming pioneer, has gambled away its lead.

The reasons for the Netflix drama are numerous.

CEO

set out to monopolize television with the streaming revolution in the same way Amazon did online trading.

But nobody talks about that anymore.

Because unlike the classic tech giants, the assumed network effects do not work with streaming.

Netflix's offering didn't get better just because the company had more customers.

And so it was that Netflix's success, of all things, spurred on its rivals -

.

The power of the algorithms that Hastings wanted to use to produce series successes on the assembly line is less than expected.

Netflix has a content problem.

Creating new mega-successes is difficult.

The competition, on the other hand, has bigger brands and heroic worlds that they are now rolling out.

In addition to the hit series "

", the streaming service HBO Max is also preparing five other "

" series.

Disney+ has six "

" series in the pipeline.

Netflix, on the other hand, is running out of big stuff: its own hit series "

" is ending soon and top stuff like "

" or "

" are being marketed by Netflix,

To show what all this means for the future of Netflix, our colleague Jonas Rest spoke to numerous insiders, competitors and series producers.

He exclusively had data evaluated and compiled everything in a story that is also the cover story of our current magazine: Netflix - the end of the illusion.

The business news of the day:

• Gas surcharge on the verge of extinction:

  The traffic light coalition buried the plans for a gas surcharge in view of the rapidly increasing energy costs.

  After Economics Minister

  Robert Habeck

  had already expressed legal doubts about the levy

  after the nationalization of the energy

  company Uniper , Finance Minister

  Christian Lindner

  has now also moved away from the project.

  SPD leader

  Saskia Esken

  expects the planned allocation to end this week.

  Instead, the coalition is now discussing how a gas price brake for the citizens can be financed.

• Right-wing populists celebrate election victory in Italy:

  The radical right has won the elections in Italy.

  The alliance of the far-right

  Fratelli d'Italia

  party , the right-wing populist

  Lega

  and the conservative

  Forza Italia

  can count on a large majority in parliament.

  Fratelli leader and Eurosceptic

  Giorgia Meloni

  is likely to become Italy's first woman prime minister.

  The shift to the right in the highly indebted country is viewed with concern in Brussels.

  The risk premiums for Italian government bonds rose significantly.

• Unilever gets a new boss:

  After 35 years with the company, CEO

  Alan Jope

  wants to leave the consumer goods group.

  2023 should be over.

• Female power at GlaxoSmithKline:

  The British pharmaceutical giant has been managed by

  Emma Walmsley

  , mother of four, for 5 years .

  Now the boss gets

  another top manager to the side with

  Julie Brown .

  Burberry 's current chief financial officer

  , Julie Brown

  , is joining GlaxoSmithKline in the same capacity.

What else kept us busy:

• The comeback of the car lobby:

  the association of the German automotive industry, the

  VDA,

  lost its power after the diesel scandal.

  Internally, people were at odds and politically reviled.

  However, the new boss

  Hildegard Müller

  has achieved a remarkable turnaround.

  Our colleague Michael Freitag describes how much the former Merkel confidante and manager had to risk in order to give the VDA new political power, and what lessons can be derived from this: The pilot - lobby queen Hildegard Müller.

• The questionable advertising ploy by Ökoworld founder Alfred Platow:

  The green investment pioneer was once at the forefront when it came to sustainability, but the competition has caught up.

  Now the founder resorts to tricks.

  Our colleague Mark Böschen explains what these are.

• How Zoom plans to rise again:

  The video conferencing provider

  Zoom

  was one of the winners of the corona crisis, along with Netflix and the fitness company Peloton.

  Then, like Netflix and Peloton, the crash came.

  A "zoom fatique" spread.

  Zoom founder

  Eric Yuan

  , who became a five-fold billionaire when his company went public in 2019, is now trying to restart.

  He's refocusing on his core clientele: businesses.

  Read here whether he can succeed in escaping and which new competitors Zoom is up against.

My recommendation for the evening:

• United Internet's construction sites: United Internet boss

  Ralph Dommermuth

  wants to heat up

  Deutsche Telekom

  and Spain

  's Teléfonica

  (O2)

  with a fast and inexpensive mobile alternative.

  But his latest project to set up his own 5G mobile network in Germany is proving to be more difficult than he thought.

  Dommermuth likes to compare his work to tinkering with an electric train, but with rising material and energy costs, license wrangling and a lack of skilled workers, he is currently struggling with almost as many permanent construction sites as the real train.

  Our colleague Mirjam Hecking describes how Dommermuth wants to break up the old structure with a bulldozer if necessary: ​​The construction sites of Ralph Dommermuth.

Cordially, your Kai Lange