The decline and fall of Quibi

The mobile streamer claimed to be the future of television - and then it all fell apart. So what happened?

Have you, by chance, heard of Quibi? Because if the TV shows Big Rad Wolf, Agua Donkeys or Shape of Pasta have failed to register on your to-watch radar, then – like most – you probably have not heard of Quibi.

A startup concocted by DreamWorks Animation co-founder Jeffrey Katzenberg and led by former Hewlett-Packard chief Meg Whitman, Quibi was slanted to be the latest challenger to Netflix’s throne, a short-form streaming service that offered ‘snackable’ original films and TV shows of ten minutes or less, in an attempt to revolutionise how consumers would watch content on the go.

The foundations seemed sound enough. The video platform – whose moniker is a portmanteau of the words ‘quick’ and ‘bite’ – lined up an all-star cast of Hollywood A-listers and producers, including Chrissy Teigen, Jennifer Lopez, LeBron James and Steven Spielberg. Prior to its rollout on 6 April it had raised $1.75bn in funding, with $1bn of that war chest being financed by big entertainment players, such as Walt Disney and Warner Media. “What Google is to search, Quibi will be to short-form video,” Katzenberg boldly announced to a crowd at South by Southwest in 2019.

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