Providing market intelligence for more than 35 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

How to protect your Cyber Monday packages from porch pirates this holiday season

Video doorbells are also a growing in popularity across the U.S. In the second quarter of 2023, 20% of U.S. households had a video doorbell, according to the Smart Home Consumer Insights Dashboard pro...

From FAST channels to co-viewing, CTV advertising will look different in 2024

Free ad-supported television is growing dramatically. According to Parks Associates, U.S. ad-supported streaming households surged to 41% in this year’s third quarter, up from 31% in Q1 2023.  From...

Why the Matter standard is becoming critical in smart home purchases

The Matter certification is quickly becoming a must-have for U.S. households looking to purchase smart home devices, according to new findings from market research firm Parks Associates. Parks...

3 Tips for Assessing Your Product Lines for 2024

A report released by Parks Associates this year found that small, local security dealer businesses are struggling to keep up with national tech-first, online-first players with a presence in multiple...