Feb 16, 2024

Paramount will fire the entire Noggin staff and close its preschool streaming platform.

When Paramount CEO Bob Bakish announced earlier this week that the company would lay off 800 employees, unconfirmed reports began appearing on social media that Paramount's preschool brand, Noggin, would be hit particularly hard.

Now Kidscreen is reporting that all Noggin staff will be laid off, the platform will stop accepting new subscribers, and will close later this year. According to the article, Noggin had 2.5 million global subscribers in 2019 and hosted more than 1,000 educational games, videos, and books in its library. Some of those titles are and will remain available on Paramount+, some will migrate to the platform, and others will be kept in storage.

The report noted that kids and family content, including animated titles, will continue to be a major part of the company's streaming strategy and that many of the Noggin titles available on Paramount+ will drive subscription, consumption, and repeat viewing. The article cites comments from a Paramount spokesperson that Nickelodeon's kids and family content is among the most watched and re-watched programming on the parent platform.

The news of Noggin's closure comes 10 months after it was reported that Paramount was looking to sell a majority stake in the company in order to prioritize its Paramount+ and Pluto TV streaming services. At the time, Paramount was said to still see future revenue potential in Noggin and wanted to turn it into a more interactive platform with the help of an investment partner. However, it appears that either an acquisition partner was not found or the company gave up on that ambition.

Launched in 1999 as a joint venture between Nickelodeon and Sesame Workshop, the parent company of Sesame Street, Noggin was initially a linear TV channel and website. Over the years, the Noggin brand was revamped several times and was not used from 2009 to 2015 after the channel was replaced by Nick.Jr. In 2015, Noggin was revived as a subscription streaming service and in 2017 introduced interactive games and play-along videos.

Noggin has been home to Paramount's top kids' family titles, including PAW Patrol, Dora the Explorer, Blue's Clues, Max & Ruby, and Peppa Pig.