Hulu is going global. The company announced on Thursday that it has launched a subscription service in Japan, marking the first time Hulu has expanded outside of the U.S.
“Since launching Hulu in 2008 in the U.S., we have been working hard to bring our service to consumers outside our home market and become a global brand,” Johannes Larcher, Hulu’s senior vice president of international, said in a statement. “Today we are taking a first, but important step to make good on our aspiration to serve customers all over the world.”
The service offers old seasons of shows like 24, Desperate Housewives, and Gossip Girl, among others. It also includes access to movies such as Pirates of the Caribbean, Armageddon, Men in Black, and more. It costs 1,480 Yen per month, which equates to about $20.
“As we’ve done in the U.S., we will rapidly and continually add content to the service,” Larcher wrote in a blog post. “The content lineup will only become more robust over time, including the addition of Japanese-produced content and content from across the Asian region in the near term.”
Similar to the U.S. service, in Japan, Hulu is available on a variety of devices including connected TVs and Andoid- and iOS-based devices. It will soon be available on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Blu-ray players from Sony and Panasonic.
To promote the service, Hulu is offering one month free for new subscribers.
Hulu is still in the middle of sales proceedings, but a buyer has not been announced yet. Companies including Google, Yahoo, Amazon, and DirecTV are reportedly interested in buying the company, and a sale is rumored to fetch between $500 million and $2 billion, depending on what the owners include in the deal.