Photo: Collected
Netflix has removed Dan Lin, the head of its film division, from his post, and it has come about three years after he took charge. Major changes are now under way at this video streaming platform, one of the most popular in the world; large-scale staff layoffs had also taken place at the company earlier.
A report by the entertainment news outlet Variety said several sources had confirmed Dan Lin’s dismissal. However, nothing detailed has been disclosed about the reason for removing him, and there has as yet been no clear announcement on who will take over the leadership of the film division after his departure.
About a thousand employees lost their jobs at Netflix last week. News that the company’s chief content officer Bela Bajaria had lost her job also came up for discussion at the same time. These successive changes have raised fresh questions about the company’s future plans and management.
Dan Lin took charge of Netflix’s film division in 2024. Before that he ran his own production company Rideback, which has been associated with well-known films such as the ‘Lego’ film series, ‘It’ and ‘Sherlock Holmes’.
Dan Lin himself had said that during his tenure at Netflix he was involved in greenlighting or acquiring the rights to 88 films. Films such as ‘Apex’, ‘Emilia Perez’ and ‘Here Comes the Flood’ came into discussion during his time.
Meanwhile, the names of Mike De Luca and Pam Abdy, former heads of Warner Bros’ film division, are being discussed as his successors. But there has been no formal announcement about their joining Netflix. The entertainment world is now watching what effect the company’s recent reshuffle has on film-making and content selection.
Background
In a message sent to employees on 14 October, Netflix co-chief executives Greg Peters and Ted Sarandos announced a cut of about a thousand posts, that is about 6 per cent of the workforce; according to documents submitted to the regulator, the company had about 16,000 full-time employees worldwide at the end of 2025 – the Associated Press reported this on 14 October.
According to a TheWrap report of 19 October, former Disney and Fox executive Peter Rice has taken over as chief content officer in place of Bela Bajaria, and Netflix Film vice-president Doug Belgrad also lost his job in the company-wide layoffs. The length of Dan Lin’s tenure differs between sources – Variety says about three years, while TheWrap says two years and puts the handover from Scott Stuber in April 2024.
The numbers
According to Netflix’s third-quarter 2026 shareholder letter, the company earned $12.90 billion in that quarter, 12 per cent more than in the same period the previous year; operating profit was $4.50 billion, up 37 per cent, and the operating margin was 34.6 per cent, against 28.2 per cent in the same quarter the previous year. The letter said the fourth-quarter operating margin could fall by about 120 basis points because of the effect of the newly announced workforce reduction.
