Providing Market Intelligence for 40 Years

In The News

Wall Street isn’t sure Roku can lead cord cutters to the promised land

One of the secrets of Roku's success has been its expansion beyond its roots as a set top box maker (a term the company tries to avoid). To do this, Roku CEO Anthony Wood built a loyal customer following by moving the company away from only selling its own boxes, instead now licensing its software to TV makers, so they can ship screens with the company's streaming TV platform built-in. This is a much higher margin business than selling streaming hardware, and almost one-third of so-called smart TVs sold last year included Roku's software.

Roku has also developed and licensed streaming programming of its own, backed by advertising. The Roku Channel, available on all its platforms, was 2019's most popular ad-backed streaming channel, ahead of rivals Pluto TV and Crackle, according to market research firm Parks Associates. That's another business that yields higher margins than producing set top boxes.

From the article "Wall Street isn’t sure Roku can lead cord cutters to the promised land" by Aaron Pressman.

Previously In The News

No more family freeloaders: Netflix to charge extra for sharing accounts

The trial is part of the streamer’s ongoing campaign to ensure revenue is not lost as the streaming space has grown increasingly competitive. According to an analysis by research firm Parks Associates...

HBO Max: WarnerMedia in Talks With Roku on Deal, Amazon Fire TV Appears to Be a No-Go

Beyond rev-share terms for HBO Max, holdouts like Roku and Amazon — which together had 69% market share of U.S. OTT households in early 2019, Parks Associates estimated — are objecting to WarnerMedia’...

Has the Pullback of Roku Stock Created an Opportunity?

Even with the recent decline of Roku stock price, the shares are still not cheap, as they have a trailing price-sales multiple of 10.75. But then again, Roku stock deserves a premium, given the compan...

How Roku Morphed From a Quirky Hardware Startup to a TV Streaming Powerhouse

Roku has kept its eye on simplicity ever since that first player while also making products that often are far more affordable than those of its competition. “People underappreciate how important pric...