The TV industry will make a record number of shows in 2017, as streaming services Netflix, Amazon and Hulu propel a swell in production that's creating an oversupply, veteran Fox executive John Landgraf said during his semiannual presentation for critics.
TV networks will make 500 original scripted shows in 2017, almost 20 percent more than the 419 produced in 2015, which was itself a record, according to Landgraf, chief executive of 21st Century Fox Inc.'s FX Networks. Netflix alone will make 71 shows — not counting the service's growing number of kids series, documentaries, movies and foreign-language programming.
The escalation in production poses a danger for TV networks and the media companies that own them, Landgraf warned. By producing more programming than viewers can watch, networks are losing money on a lot of shows.
"We are ballooning into oversupply, and that balloon will eventually deflate," Landgraf said. "I continue to believe there is a greater supply of TV than can be produced profitably."
Cable TV continues to be Fox's biggest business. Last quarter, revenue grew 9.9 percent to $3.92 billion for the unit, while profit fell slightly to $1.21 billion. The company is planning new investments in programming with $200 million to refresh the schedule at the National Geographic network and expand original series at FX.
It's not the first time Landgraf has sounded this warning about oversupply. He's widely credited with coining the term "peak TV" at the Television Critics Association tour a couple of years ago. Peak TV is the notion that the industry is producing shows at an unsustainable rate, and is overwhelming viewers and critics.
Yet the growing ambitions of online-streaming services took the industry by surprise. Landgraf mistakenly had predicted a decline in production by 2017. Now he says that won't happen until at least 2019.
Netflix has been a particular target for the former NBC executive. Landgraf said his rivals in Los Gatos, Calif., are secretive and don't apply the same human touch to all their shows. Netflix spends six times as much money on shows as FX and will soon produce more shows than HBO, Showtime, Starz and FX combined, said Landgraf, who has run FX since 2005.