Netflix wins rights to stream new tech-critical Silicon Valley corporate drama

Netflix will be aiming to replicate the success of HBO Max’s Succession with its own corporate thriller, Thumblite. Starring Rosamund Pike, the show will probably be heavily critical of the tech world.

Thumblite is set in the charged world of Silicon Valley business dealings and will examine the schemes, rivalries, visions, and obsessions of the industry’s power brokers, the press release says.

Just like on Succession, a hugely popular HBO Max show, there’s going to be a lot of money – and anxiety only the rich can probably feel – in the new series.

In order to be able to create and show Thumblite, Netflix had to win a good old bidding war with other entertainment giants.

Interestingly, though, some of the rivals apparently didn’t engage in the auction due to the humiliating possibility of Thumblite portraying the dark side of the tech world. According to Deadline, that’s why both Apple TV+ and Amazon Prime Video backed out of the process.

There’s no script yet, but it’s not difficult to imagine the show being critical of the high-tech industry. One of the series' creators is Scott Galloway, a professor of marketing at New York University’s Stern School of Business.

Galloway is best known for co-hosting the Pivot with Kara Swisher, an award-winning veteran tech journalist.

He also wrote The Four: The Hidden DNA of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google in 2017. The book asks how the tech giants have infiltrated our lives so completely that they’re almost impossible to ignore and why the stock market forgives these companies for sins that would surely destroy others.

Either way, Thumblite is going to be the first multiseason scripted series set in Silicon Valley since HBO’s eponymous comedy.