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Bloomberg to offer streaming TV service Quicktake on Xumo, Tubi

A still frame from a Bloomberg Quicktake broadcast. (Photo: Bloomberg LP, Graphic: The Desk)

Financial news organization Bloomberg will bring its consumer streaming TV service Quicktake to several streaming services later this month.

The channel, an offshoot of the popular social media brand formed in 2017, officially launched as a streaming service earlier this month with 10 hours of financial news, analysis, documentaries and other programming aimed at a young audience.

The streaming channel builds on Bloomberg’s success with Quicktake on Twitter and other social media platforms since it launched several years ago. The service, which was originally called TicToc and later rebranded to avoid confusion with the similarly-named video app, reaches 50 million unique visitors a month, according to an executive who spoke with the Wall Street Journal.

Bloomberg Quicktake is hoping to reach the same youth-oriented audience as Cheddar, a streaming-only financial news channel that was purchased by cable company Altice for $200 million last year.

Unlike Cheddar, which is primarily available in the United States on pay TV platforms (an abbreviated version of the network is distributed on Pluto TV), Bloomberg says it wants to take Quicktake global.

To achieve this, Bloomberg will make Quicktake available on several free streaming platforms. The channel will launch on Samsung’s Smart TV Plus on November 18 and will be distributed via Comcast’s Xumo and Fox Corporation’s Tubi streaming apps later this year, the Journal said.

Bloomberg’s strategy with Quicktake builds on a direct-to-consumer model that has been the focal point of the company in recent years. The company recently started charging visitors of its Bloomberg website and that of an associate publication, Businessweek, around $40 a month to read its written stories online.

A Bloomberg executive said the website had around 250,000 paying subscribers to Bloomberg’s website, putting it on track to earn $100 million in subscription revenue by the end of the year.

Bloomberg is hoping to achieve the same level of success with Quicktake: Out of the company’s 3,000 global journalists, more than 100 workers are dedicated to producing video content for the service, and more hires are expected in the coming months, an executive said.

Quicktake is currently available via the Bloomberg TV app for Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, Android TV and Roku as well as Bloomberg’s smartphone and tablet apps. A web version of Bloomberg TV’s cable and satellite feed will continue to be offered online as well.

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About the Author:

Matthew Keys

Matthew Keys covers the business of broadcast and streaming TV, radio broadcasting, social media, technology and telecommunications. A journalist for over 15 years, Matthew previously worked at Thomson Reuters, KGO-TV in San Francisco, KTXL in Sacramento and McNaughton Newspapers. He received 9 California Journalism Awards between 2018 and 2020, and is a member of IRE (Investigative Reporters and Editors).
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