Ted Sarandos

Ted Sarandos is the Co-CEO and Chief Content Officer of Netflix, the world's largest streaming entertainment service with over 280 million subscribers globally. Born in 1964 in Phoenix, Arizona, Sarandos did not attend college but began working at a video rental store as a teenager, developing an encyclopedic knowledge of film and television that would shape his career. He joined Netflix in 2000, when it was still a DVD-by-mail company with a few hundred thousand subscribers. Sarandos is widely credited as the architect of Netflix's transformation into a content powerhouse. His pivotal decision to invest in original programming — launching with House of Cards and Orange Is the New Black in 2013 — fundamentally changed the entertainment industry. He pioneered the model of releasing entire seasons at once, introduced data-driven content commissioning, and proved that a technology company could compete with and ultimately surpass traditional Hollywood studios. Under Sarandos's content leadership, Netflix now spends over $17 billion annually on content, producing films, series, documentaries, and games across virtually every genre and language. The platform's international expansion strategy, driven by Sarandos's belief in locally produced content with global appeal (exemplified by Squid Game, Money Heist, and Dark), has made Netflix a truly global entertainment platform present in 190+ countries. Promoted to Co-CEO alongside Greg Peters in 2023 after Reed Hastings stepped up to Executive Chairman, Sarandos now oversees both content and business strategy. He navigates Netflix through the era of streaming maturation — balancing content spending against profitability, implementing the ad-supported tier, cracking down on password sharing, and maintaining subscriber growth as every major media company competes for streaming attention.