Netflix Regime Change: Ruthless Cuts Set the Stage for a New Era at Streaming Giant

Even though Ted Sarandos had long been telegraphing that a major reorganization was ahead at Netflix , Bela Bajaria didn’t expect the ax was coming for her role. Days ago, the chief content officer at the streaming giant was in Cannes receiving an honor while the MIPCOM marketplace was in full swing, before turning to unveil a major World Cup media rights deal a day later. As lower level executives were being informed of pink slips, sources tell The Hollywood Reporter , Bajaria did not know she was going to be ousted until at least Wednesday and had been personally informing staff of company layoffs.

Even as speculation centered on Bajaria’s role — when times are tough, the top programming chief is always on the hot seat — jaws dropped inside Netflix when the one-two punch of the ousting and former Fox exec Peter Rice’s arrival was announced internally.

In hindsight, much could be made about the smoke signals that Sarandos was putting out to the town. The Netflix honcho had met with HBO chief Casey Bloys multiple times this year, including a very public one at Superba, the airy restaurant on Sunset near the Netflix offices that also serves as the streamer’s unofficial commissary. “He did that so people could see it,” says one source. “It was putting Bela on notice.”

Nevertheless, the Bajaria/Rice swap has been discombobulating for Netflix employees (“it’s been bumpy,” one says), many of whom have already been reeling from the streaming giant’s stock slide. Netflix strongly encourages employees to take a portion of their pay in the form of equity, but with shares down more than 45 percent from a year ago employees who have done so are feeling the pain.

But it also portends a major strategic shift for the company, even if that new plan remains obscured for the time being. Sarandos and Peters are expected to elaborate on their thinking next Tuesday afternoon when they brief Wall Street analysts for Netflix’s quarterly earnings update. Sarandos told staff Thursday in an email that they will hold a companywide town hall on Oct. 21 to dig into more granular details: “I want everyone to hear how we’re thinking about the strategy and our execution amid this week’s changes, and to have a chance to ask questions,” he wrote.

But the job market for Hollywood execs, clearly, is just getting tighter and tighter. “It’s a game of musical chairs and the music has stopped,” says one executive who works with Netflix.

With the Bajaria ouster done and dusted, the industry’s eyes are now trained on film chief Dan Lin, who held an urgent meeting with the film team at the company on Thursday night to go over the shake up. In this week’s layoffs, Lin’s No. 2, VP of film Doug Belgrad, was swept out, among other film side executives. Belgrad was known as a manager of managers at the company. And his layer had effectively been axed.

Lin joined the company in 2024, hired by Bajaria from his own production outfit, where he amassed a handful of $1 billion hits. The exec was brought in to rein in filmmaker spending and streamline Netflix’s notoriously unwieldy film operation.