Streaming television service Fubo TV says it has incorporated four new free, ad-supported streaming channels on its pay television lineup.
The move comes after Fubo TV inked a distribution partnership with Trusted Media Brands (TMB) to bring their four free channels — People are Awesome, The Pet Collective, Fail Army and WeatherSpy — to Fubo TV’s subscribers.
The ad-supported channels are offered in part to help keep programming costs low for Fubo TV subscribers, executives said in a press release on Monday. In addition to the TMB channels, Fubo TV also offers ABC News Live, Fox Weather, Law & Crime Network, Bloomberg Quicktake and Tastemade Travel. The company also programs and distributes its own free, ad-supported channels, including Fubo Sports Network and Fubo Movie Network.
“Launching FAST channels, like TMB’s popular brands, on FuboTV enables us to expand our programming offering while keeping costs low for consumers,” Henry Ahn, Fubo TV’s chief business officer, said in a statement. “These channels offer a wide range of sports, news and entertainment content that are a perfect complement to FuboTV’s premium channels.”
Though the channels are free to access on platforms like Paramount Global’s Pluto TV, the Roku Channel and Comcast’s Xumo, the free, ad-supported networks on Fubo TV requires an active subscription to view. That subscription starts at $70 a month and goes up depending on whether a user adds channels or features. The strategy is different from Dish Network’s Sling TV, which also offers free, ad-supported channels but doesn’t require a user to have a subscription to its $35 a month service to view them.
For Fubo TV, though, the addition of the channels may ultimately have less to do with offering subscribers choice or keeping them locked into the service, and more to do with generating revenue.
“Diversifying our revenue streams, particularly with our ad sales business, is one of many strategies we are deploying to achieve our profitability targets,” David Gandler, Fubo TV’s co-founder and chief executive, said on Monday.
