Netflix Deploys Robots to Handle DVDs

choi

Emily Steel, The Disc Isn’t Dead, Just More Efficient; As streaming booms, Netflix still pulls in profit from DVDs. New York Times, July 27, 2015.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/2 ... s-old-business.html

My comment:
(a) Fremont, California
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fremont,_California
(b) “The machine sucked a returned Netflix mailer into the system then proceeded to slice open the envelope, identify and clean the disc inside, check that the DVD worked and reinsert it into the original sleeve. * * * About 3,400 discs zip through the rental return machine each hour”

mailer (n): "(US & Canadian) a container for mailing things"
www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/mailer
(c) “Netflix now counts more than 65 million streaming members in more than 50 countries * * * But that breakneck growth comes at a cost: The company expects its streaming business to just break even globally through 2016 * * * Helping fuel that expansion is the company’s dwindling, often ignored DVD-by-mail operation * * * Netflix has 5.3 million DVD subscribers, a significant falloff from its peak of about 20 million in 2010; still, the division continues to churn out hundreds of millions of dollars in profit each year. * * * the [DVD] group has kept a core base of customers, particularly in rural zones with lackluster Internet service and among people who want access to the breadth of its selection * * * Here at the Fremont hub, Netflix used to employ about 100 people to handle the returning, sorting and shipping of the DVDs. Today, about 25 employees work through the night, largely assisting the machines. Their shifts start at about 2 am. By 8 am, the discs are out the door and the steady buzz of the machines starts to fade.”

I do not know how the DVD division is more efficient now than in 2010, say. DVD subscribers then were four times as many as today’s. But see (e).
(d) “If anything, the Netflix story is one of perpetual change. The software executives Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph founded Netflix in 1997 to offer online movie rentals by mail. Netflix introduced streaming in 2007 * * * Netflix’s transformation has been rocky at times, but its evolution has become an example of how companies can adapt, tapping their legacy businesses to fuel growth in new areas as the ground underneath them shifts.  Executives said the process was challenging and required juggling two distinct cultures, one with fast-paced growth and the other in long-term decline, as well as managing intense pressure from investors and investing in new initiatives, many of which did not work. * * * AOL [] for years slogged through a transformation of its own — from a subscription-based Internet service to an ad-supported digital media business. When AOL was sold to Verizon Communications last month, most of its profits still came from its legacy subscription business.
(e) “Netflix had about 93,000 titles on DVD * * * Recently released films tend to be available only on DVD and not on the streaming service because of rights issues. * * * At its peak, Netflix operated about 50 distribution centers across the country. Now that number is down to 33. The introduction of automation technologies has allowed the company to process more DVDs”
(f) Netflix Uses Cognex Image-Based Barcode Readers to Automate the DVD Return Process. Cognex, undated
http://link.coremotivesmarketing ... 3c0207e4948d84f16d4