Hulu Aims High: Report from the Upfront

Hulu had their upfront yesterday and while there was a lot to announce, it all felt slightly anticlimactic given that the big story, that Hulu plans to launch a virtual MVPD service, had already been leaked. They’ve got Fox and ABC on board, NBC in negotiations and if they can get CBS, they just might have something that will shake up the industry.That’s a really big deal and given that they are owned by the networks, Hulu has the best chance of actually pulling something like this off. (Much better than Google-owned YouTube, who Bloomberg alleged was also looking to launch a virtual pay-TV service.)Hulu’s ad sales lead Peter Naylor also rolled out some well-designed ad products. There is Nielsen measurement on connected TV devices like Roku, Apple TV, Xbox and PlayStation, particularly significant given that Hulu reports that 70% of its views come through the TV these days, rather than laptops and tablets.Other notable plays include an interactive ad experience via BrightLine that will be sponsored by Havas, greater data insights thanks to a partnership with Millward Brown, and VR play in conjunction with Live Nation.No live streaming though. At least not yet.In terms of original content, Hulu renewed “The Path” and “The Mindy Project” for a second and fifth season, respectively, and announced several new shows, including “Shut Eye” a drama about psychics, “Chance” a noir-ish thriller starring Hugh Laurie, and a new series based on the novel “A Handmaid’s Tale” that will feature Mad Men's Elizabeth Moss.Hulu is of great interest to TV[R]EV because it is the only ad-supported premium streaming service. (Well, Crackle, but kind of.) Hulu is thus able to offer addressable, audience-based advertising on all its shows and provide advertisers with the sort of data they’d love to have from all their TV buys. Given the popularity of Hulu’s programming (subscriber numbers are up 30% and due to hit 12 million this year) it will be interesting to see how advertisers react to their offerings and how a more popular Hulu handles the ad load issue. Hulu maintains a lower ad load than other networks, and their $12/month ad-free version has not proven to be as popular as the $8/month ad-supported model. A large part of the appeal of that ad-supported model is, in our opinion, due to the more tolerable ad load.Final note: a big thank you to Hulu for making us laugh first thing in the morning with a very funny set from Billy Eichner, Julie Klausner  and executive producer Amy Poehler from their original series “Difficult People." If you haven't seen the first season of "Difficult People" it's well worth it.