Netflix Hires DivX Executive

2 Sep, 2008 By: Erik Gruenwedel

Netflix has named Bill Holmes to the position of VP of business development.

Holmes, who reports to CEO Reed Hastings in Los Gatos, Calif., was VP of business development at DivX, a San Diego-based digital media company that creates, distributes and licenses digital-video technology.

While at DivX, Holmes negotiated licensing deals with silicon providers such as Qualcomm, SanDisk, Broadcom and Matsushita, among others.

In May, Netflix and Roku bowed the Netflix Player by Roku, the first device to instantly stream movies and TV episodes from Netflix to the TV. This month, LG Electronics will start shipping a Blu-ray player that can stream content from Netflix to the TV. Additionally, this fall Microsoft’s Xbox 360 will make instant streaming from Netflix available to its Xbox LIVE Gold members.

Streaming to the PC and TV is offered at no additional charge to Netflix members.

“Bill will lead the ever-increasing effort by Netflix to develop more partnerships with consumer electronics companies as we enter the era of Web-on-TV,” Hastings said in a statement.