Dish Network in Line to Get Hulu?

Hulu has not announced any decision on whether it will sell, or to whom it might sell. There are reports Dish Network was the highest bidder, coming in around $1.9 billion, topping both Amazon and Yahoo. Google bid much more, something in the range of $4 billion, but Google wanted special conditions. Google wanted more content for a longer period of time, and perhaps other concessions as well. Highest Bid For Hulu

But the bidders all figured out pretty quickly that the TV companies who own Hulu now want to phase out free ad-supported content completely. So as soon as the current set of Hulu contracts expire in a couple of years, it would be back to the negotiating table. In other words, aside from buying the brand, and some back office technology, the new owners would not be acquiring the existing set of content offerings, which is the whole point.

In April 2011 Jason Kilar, Hulu CEO noted that the company was on pace to approach half a billion dollars in revenue in 2011. In the first quarter, Hulu revenue grew approximately 90 percent over the first quarter of 2010. (Hulu did $263 million in revenue for all of 2010).

The content community will earn approximately $300 million through Hulu over the course of 2011. Hulu served approximately 50 percent more advertisers in the first quarter of 2011 than in the first quarter of 2010. Hulu revenue growth

Any new buyer would have to commit additional funds to get continued access to the content underlying that growth, though.