Hulu (known outside Japan as Hulu Japan) is a Japanese subscription streaming service service owned and operated by Nippon TV. It was launched as the Japanese version of the same-named American service in September 2011. It was acquired by Nippon TV in 2014 and branched off from its American counterpart and it offers a library of television series from other television broadcasters including NHK, TBS Television, Fuji Television, and TV Tokyo among others, as well as original programming.

, Hulu Japan has a total of 2.8 million subscribers in Japan. In March 2015, Hulu Japan subscription's numbers had risen to 1 million memberships in all time record for the service. This service was the sixth highest-grossing subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) service in Japan as of 2022.

History 

On September 1, 2011, Hulu, a video distribution service operating in the United States, launched its first overseas expansion in Japan. The business in Japan was to be conducted by Hulu Japan GK, a wholly owned subsidiary of Hulu. The company signed content distribution agreements with CBS, NBC, 20th Century Fox, Warner Bros. and The Walt Disney Company. Users were charged a monthly fee of 1,480 yen, and unlike in the U.S., no free service was offered.

The Japanese user base is characterized by a relatively large number of customers viewing on smartphones and tablets compared to the United States. Compared to the U.S., more Japanese viewers use smartphones and tablets to watch movies. In addition, the trend in frequency and viewing time shows that many viewers are watching a single movie in "small segments," said Kazushi Sawa, General Manager, Content & Alliance Division, Hulu Japan GK.

In January 2012, Hulu Japan began streaming films owned by Toho, a distribution company primarily responsible for the release of Universal films in Japan. The following month, Hulu Japan announced that it had signed contracts to distribute content from Japanese film distributors Asmik Ace Entertainment, Kadokawa Shoten, Shochiku, Toei, Nikkatsu, and AMG Entertainment to distribute their content.

The fee was reduced to 980 yen in April 2012. The number of users of the service exceeded 1.85 million as of March, seven months after its launch. In November 2013, Hulu Japan announced a partnership with TBS Television to distribute over 3,000 episodes of TBS content. At the time, the service delivered approximately 14,000 titles.

On February 27, 2014, Nippon Television Network Corporation acquired Hulu's Japanese business from Hulu, LLC for an undisclosed amount; the new company, HJ Holdings GK, established by Hulu, LCC through a corporate separation, would become a subsidiary of Nippon TV. The service would continue to license and retain the "Hulu" brand and technology in Japan under a subsidiary of Nippon as part of a separate agreement. After the acquisition of the service Hulu Japan's Vice Chairman Masafumi Funakoshi would state that he was aiming for the service to reach ¥150 billion in revenue by 2020. Even after the acquisition by Nippon TV, Hulu continued to distribute programming from NHK, TBS Television, and TV Tokyo on its platform.

On May 29, 2015, HJ Holdings announced that it would collaborate with Fuji Television to supply each other's content in the video streaming business. At Hulu Japan, some programs from NHK and all five major commercial television stations in Tokyo became available for viewing. However, only Fuji Television was part of the content sharing agreement.

In June 2015, Hulu released its first original drama series, The Last Cop, a remake of the German drama series Der letzte Bulle. In October, a sequel drama series was co-produced with Nippon TV and broadcast on Nippon TV. A sequel was released in theaters on May 3, 2017, as Last Cop The Movie and grossed 400 million yen at the box office.

On February 16, 2016, HJ Holdings announced that it had signed an exclusive contract with the American cable channel HBO for a subscription video on demand (SVOD) service in Japan.

On May 8, 2017, HJ Holdings announced a revamp of its service. The reason for the revamp being that, despite Nippon TV's acquisition of Hulu Japan, Hulu Japan's distribution system was common with that of the United States, and thus could not undergo Japan-specific modifications. In addition, the URL of "hulu.jp" has been changed to "happyon.jp" which was later revert back to "hulu.jp" in 2019. The reason for the change was to reduce risk during the system migration, and to make the transition without stopping the service. This sudden change in the URL made users anxious that the name of the service might be changed, or that the service structure might be drastically altered.

On May 17, 2017, the revamp took place, but the service could not be used properly for several days. Also, without notice, changes were made to the copyright protection rules, and some users who had externally connected their displays were unable to view the service. This situation caused Hulu to offer users "Hulu 1 month free ticket", "Amazon gift certificate (1000 yen)" or "iTunes code (1000 yen)", and also caused the first decrease in users since the acquisition.

On May 16, 2017, Hulu announced that it had 1,551,595 paid subscribers in March but in July 2017, however, the service announced that subscription numbers fell by 3,787 to 1,547,812 in June.

In July 2017, Hulu Japan conducted a third-party allotment of shares with Yahoo! Japan, Toho, Yomiuri TV, and Chukyo TV as subscribers of the service with the purpose being to strengthen the management foundation and enable the production and procurement of more attractive content and significantly improve promotional capabilities.

Hulu Japan launched its TVOD service, Hulu Store, on June 10, 2020. The store being available for SVOD members. In June 2022, Hulu Japan introduced a new feature called "Points" which would allow users to rent or purchase videos from the Hulu Store on the Hulu app for Android and iOS devices with that feature enabling users to make one-time purchases of content within the app.

On July 12, 2023, HJ Holdings announced and launched the first-ever bundled plan between Walt Disney Japan and the video streaming services Hulu and Disney+. The plan, called "Hulu | Disney+ Set Plan," is available from the same day. This plan offers a monthly subscription price of 1,490 yen, which represents a savings of approximately 26% compared to subscribing to them separately.

Content

Programming 
The distributors who license content to Hulu include NHK, TBS Television, Fuji Television, and TV Tokyo, among others.

In addition, Hulu Japan has its own programming that is feed from its parent company Nippon TV that is available through the service.

Sports 
Hulu is streaming all Japan Rugby League One events, B.League basketball, Yomiuri Giants (which is owned by Yomiuri Shimbun Holdings who also owns Nippon TV) baseball, and All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW) events (from 1972 until 1999 which footage is owned by Nippon TV).

Starting from August 2022, Hulu Japan signed a multi-year domestic distribution partnership agreement with Eredivisie to broadcast games from 2022–23 season onwards mainly Ajax and AZ Alkmaar games.

References

External links 

 
 Corporate site - 

Hulu
Hulu Japan
Android (operating system) software
Nippon TV
Nippon News Network
Internet properties established in 2011
Internet television streaming services
IOS software
PlayStation 4 software
PlayStation 5 software
Subscription video on demand services
Toho
Z Holdings