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.
Even among U.S. households with broadband service, newly released market research from Parks Associates found that less than 30 percent of respondents were familiar with where to buy smart-home produc...
For movie and TV studios, the big bugaboo is people illegally copying or downloading their IP. For SVOD services, it’s another form of piracy – password sharing, which cost companies $500 million worl...
Too many subscription services, however, can really add up in terms of monthly expenses. Fifty percent of American households have four or more streaming subscriptions, according to the market researc...
Security system use is particularly common in multi-dwelling properties. Parks Associates research shows that 41% of multi-dwelling unit (MDU) property managers have a security/access system for commo...
