CNN's new streaming service is shutting down just weeks after its pricey launch, 'a combination of the wrong strategy and wrong capital allocation'

• At the end of March, CNN launched a paid subscription streaming service: CNN+.
• Three weeks later, new parent company Warner Bros. Discovery is shuttering the service.

CNN's new paid streaming service, CNN+, is shuttering after just a few weeks of life.

The news was first reported by Variety, which cited multiple anonymous sources. Warner Bros. Discovery, which acquired CNN along with other former WarnerMedia assets in a $43 billion merger that closed April 8, confirmed the move with a statement from Chris Licht, chairman and CEO of CNN Worldwide.

The service will stop streaming April 30, the company said.

"As we become Warner Bros. Discovery, CNN will be strongest as part of WBD's streaming strategy which envisions news as an important part of a compelling broader offering along with sports, entertainment, and nonfiction content," Licht said in the statement.

"We have therefore made the decision to cease operations of CNN+ and focus our investment on CNN's core news-gathering operations and in further building CNN Digital. This is not a decision about quality; we appreciate all of the work, ambition and creativity that went into building CNN+, an organization with terrific talent and compelling programming. But our customers and CNN will be best served with a simpler streaming choice."

CNN also announced that Andrew Morse, the executive who led the charge on CNN+, would depart the company. "We are grateful to Andrew for his significant contributions to CNN Digital and CNN+ over the years,'' Licht's statement said. "He and his team created a quality slate of rich and compelling content and helped produce and distribute CNN's journalism around the world on a variety of platforms.''

Morse was one of three execs who led CNN in the interim following the sudden departure of former leader Jeff Zucker, in February. Licht was named as Zucker's replacement on February 26.

At an employee town hall in New York on Tuesday soon after the announcement, Licht told CNN+ staffers, "You built a beautiful house but we need an apartment," according to a company insider.

CNN+ originally launched on March 29: For $5.99 each month — or $2.99 a month "for life" in an early promotional push — the service offers access to a library of new and old shows starring well-known faces from the cable news channel.

That includes every season of Anthony Bourdain's "Parts Unknown," which concluded with Bourdain's death in 2018, as well as new shows made specifically for the new service, like "Who's Talking to Chris Wallace?" The library is a mix of news shows hosted by CNN personalities like Anderson Cooper and Christiane Amanpour, and culture shows hosted by celebrities like W. Kamau Bell and Stanley Tucci.

Instead, those shows will appear on either CNN or some of its parent company's other streaming services, the memo from Licht said. Current subscribers will reportedly get "prorated refunds" on their subscription fees, according to The New York Times.

The launch of CNN+ was complicated by the just-completed merger of Warner Bros. with Discovery, and the shakeup in leadership after Zucker's exit.

Insider previously reported that CNN spent as much as $250 million on the launch and saw slow adoption of the service out of the gate.

Incoming Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav is said to have disliked the decision to launch CNN+ just weeks before the completion of the merger, according to Variety.

Two people familiar with the launch previously told Insider outgoing WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar insisted the company stick with the planned Q1 date and not postpone it until after the merger. "It was a vanity project for [Kilar] and Zucker. They wanted to launch it," said one insider.

One Warner Bros. Discovery executive told Insider that the service's demise was "a combination of the wrong strategy and wrong capital allocation."

"Admittedly we spent way too much, but I'm sad for all the people" losing their jobs, this person said. "It's going to be a tough few months for the company."

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