Amazon boss Jeff Bezos is primed and ready for a fresh assault on the streaming-video space. The e-commerce giant will roll out a new ad-supported streaming offering early next year that will be separate from its $99-a-year Prime membership, which includes a video service, sources said. The ad-supported option — part of an overhaul of its media offerings — poses a serious challenge to streaming rivals such as Hulu and Netflix, analysts said. “If they do an ad-supported service, they will decouple it from Prime and that is a Netflix killer,” Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter said. “It won’t be $99 a year.” Pachter suggested Amazon would undercut Netflix’s current monthly price of $7.99. “Who wouldn’t switch if you were poor or you’re a cord-cutter?” he added.
