Netflix reveals $587 million price for Ben Affleck’s AI startup
A new SEC filing puts a firm number on Netflix’s March purchase of InterPositive, the AI filmmaking company founded by Ben Affleck.
By Poppy Nakagawa · Culture Writer
3 min read
Netflix put $587 million on the table for Ben Affleck’s AI company, InterPositive, according to a new federal filing.
The streamer disclosed the price in its Form 10-Q report with the Securities and Exchange Commission, saying it completed an acquisition in March for a total purchase price of about $587 million. The filing gives the clearest public figure yet for the deal, which brought Affleck’s stealth-mode startup inside Netflix.
Bloomberg reported in March that the transaction could be worth as much as $600 million for Affleck and InterPositive’s investors, depending on performance targets, even if the company’s purchase price came in below that number. Netflix did not immediately respond to Variety’s request for comment, according to the trade publication.
What Netflix bought
Affleck founded InterPositive in 2022 and kept the company largely out of public view before the Netflix sale. When the deal was announced, Netflix said the aim was to build AI tools that kept filmmakers in control of the creative process.
The acquisition brought InterPositive’s 16-person staff of engineers, researchers and creatives to Netflix. Affleck also joined the streamer as a senior adviser.
InterPositive’s tools are designed to let filmmakers create an AI model from production dailies, then use it to assist with post-production jobs such as sound mixing, relighting footage and adding visual effects. The company’s approach was described as separate from more typical generative visual work.
Affleck framed the sale as part of a long-running link between movie artists and new technology. In the merger announcement, he said: “From the invention of the moving image to the transition to digital, from motion capture to virtual production, technology has evolved alongside the artists who use it.”
He added that the two companies shared a commitment to that idea, calling the Netflix tie-up a natural next step and pointing to the streamer’s experience using technology at scale.
AI is already on the Netflix slate
Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos discussed the InterPositive acquisition and the company’s wider AI use during the streamer’s second-quarter earnings call on Thursday. Netflix said roughly 300 of its titles have used some form of generative AI this year.
Sarandos said the InterPositive deal was still in its early stage, but he said Netflix was already seeing effects from the startup’s work alongside other tools developed inside the company.
He also cited the docuseries “The American Experiment,” saying AI helped create sequences twice as fast and at half the cost of earlier options. Even while pointing to those savings, Sarandos said Netflix was not looking to swap out artists for software.
“We believe it takes great artists to make something great, and AI is not changing that,” Sarandos said. “Movies are being made by people who make movies. AI provides them with better tools to make them even better.”
This story draws on original reporting from Variety.