About Meg Whitman
Meg Whitman, the former U.S. Ambassador to Kenya who served from 2022 to 2024, has relocated to New Mexico and is now a resident of the state. In a March 2026 podcast interview, she discussed New Mexico's economic potential, stating that the state is "on the cusp of something remarkable" and contrasting that view with perceptions of historically slow economic growth. She has also participated in events with Elevate New Mexico, a partnership focused on economic development, where she argued that New Mexico needs a full-time, well-paid legislature to fulfill its potential and that the state could become an "energy leader" as artificial intelligence increases energy demand Mend. Whitman has also advocated for a cap on malpractice insurance in the state, saying it would help retain doctors.
During her tenure as ambassador, Whitman was a vocal advocate for U.S. investment in Kenya, frequently delivering a presentation titled "Why Africa, Why Kenya." She argued that Kenya is the "tech capital of East Africa" and the leading destination for venture capital on the continent. She also publicly urged the Kenyan government to address issues she said were important for attracting foreign investment, including establishing a "consistent, transparent, and fairly administered national tax policy" and tackling corruption, which she described as a major challenge. Following the 2024 U.S. election, Whitman resigned her post)Skip. She has since commented on the elimination of USAID, stating that the move is "ceding ground to the Chinese" in Africa and that countries like Kenya, which she described as "very indebted," cannot easily cope with the sudden loss of that aid.
Source: AI-verified profile updated from Meg Whitman's recent appearances.
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✨ AI-enhanced transcript with speaker attribution
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Host0:00
My pleasure. So we know that could be debuting last week short form videos of 10 minutes or less, and in this COVID outbreak, they're doing very well. Announcing this morning 1.7 million downloads, exceeding their own expectations, and the markets represent one of the strongest debuts for any brand-new apps in recent memory. So let's bring in CEO Meg Whitman, who joins us for more. Meg, from what I understand, Jennifer Lopez's "Thanks a Million" is your most popular on the platform in the first week, but you're giving it away for free for 90 days. I'm just wondering how many of these customers will stick with you when they have to start paying.
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Meg Whitman0:35
Well, first of all, thanks for having me. Delighted to be here, and we're really pleased by our launch. You're right, Jennifer Lopez is in one of the most popular shows, although we have other ones: Liam Hemsworth and "The Most Dangerous Game," LeBron James and "I Promise." But when COVID hit, we made a decision. We originally thought we would have a two-week free trial, then we said, given the economic circumstances, let's just do 90 days for people. It'll give them a long time to not have to pay for the service, and then in three months we'll know. In the industry, they call it "roll to pay" — how many people decide to stay with us. Impossible to know at this point, but what we also know is if you sign up by the end of April, that's when you get your 90-day free trial. If you sign up in May, you would obviously get back to the normal two-week free trial, so we'll have a little sense of roll to pay earlier than July.
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Host1:24
Now, Meg, you've said before you don't want to compete with Hulu, you don't want to compete with Netflix, or even Disney. Disney announcing last week that they have 50 million paying subscribers and they're spending a lot on content, as the rest of players are. I'm just wondering from your perspective, do you feel you need to spend more? From what I understand, you're spending a hundred thousand dollars a minute, up to six million dollars per show.
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Meg Whitman1:45
Yeah, right now we feel great about the lineup of content we have. Remember, all content is new, made for Quibi because it has to be made to look great on your mobile phone, whether you're watching in portrait vertically or in landscape — what they call landscape, which is horizontal. And so it's all fresh content, and we have about three hours of fresh content every day. It's made for mobile, so it's completely different. So we feel great. We have enough content to last us now through November. And this is important because all of Hollywood is shut down, like the rest of the country. We'll see how our users consume, and if we continue on this path of downloads, we certainly can afford more if we think it's the right thing to do.
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Stuart Varney2:28
Meg, can I just jump into this for a second? I'm Stuart Varney here from somewhere in New Jersey. I think you've got my number, Meg. I think you even realize that most people, certainly myself, have a very short attention span these days. Is that why you made the videos 10 minutes or less?
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Meg Whitman2:49
Yes, that's exactly why. You know, an analogy in another medium, Stuart, that I think you'll totally appreciate is "The Da Vinci Code." Do you remember Dan Brown's novel? What you probably don't remember is Dan Brown's novel is 464 pages and 105 chapters. Every chapter is five pages long because he said, "My readers don't have 45 minutes to read anymore."
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Host3:10
So, Meg, I know you've raised a lot of money, a billion dollars so far, and closed another half a billion dollars earlier this year. I'm just wondering if you feel that you need to raise more cash to go up against the giants.
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Meg Whitman3:20
I think right now we feel really good about where we are. We're doing something so different than a big OTT streaming service. We've got three kinds of content on our app: we've got movies in chapters, we've got unscripted and documentary series — as I said, like the "I Promise" documentary — and then we have daily essentials, which is news and sports and gaming news and celebrity news, all in six minutes delivered for a millennial audience. And right now we feel great about our path to profitability. We feel great about our economic model, and we don't actually anticipate needing to raise any more money, depending on how things go. But we're feeling pretty good about where we are. And obviously, as I said, if the downloads continue at this rate, we'll have opportunities to raise more money if we think we need to.
