Comcast and Charter’s streaming joint venture Xumo has powered Google’s suite of free, ad-supported streaming television (FAST) channels for more than a year, Now, Xumo is going to help Google make some serious cash off those channels.
On Monday, the companies announced the evolution of their partnership with Xumo agreeing to sell advertising inventory within Google TV Freeplay, the FAST platform baked into most Google TV and Android TV-powered streaming devices and TV sets.
For about a year, Google has offered its FAST platforms with white-label versions of channels from Xumo, which distributes nearly all of Google TV Freeplay’s content streams through its own FAST platform called Xumo Play.
Google TV Freeplay and Xumo Play will continue to exist as separate services — Xumo Play is also available on non-Android and Google devices — but advertisers who buy inventory against Xumo Play and other Xumo products will now be able to run their campaigns within Google TV Freeplay content streams, too.
Moving forward, Google TV Freeplay will mention that the platform is “powered by Xumo,” a spokesperson affirmed on Monday.
“Advertisers know that streaming is the future of TV but reaching audiences holistically and at scale remains a challenge that can hinder more media investment,” Ying Wang, the General Manager of Xumo Advertising, said in a statement. “By adding Google TV Freeplay to Xumo’s growing list of inventory partners, we are making it easier than ever for advertisers to seamlessly reach incremental audiences across a variety of streaming platforms, far beyond FAST channels to smart TVs and other connected devices.”
In addition to its own FAST platform and its partnership with Google TV Freeplay, Xumo powers more than 1,750 streaming content channels across 20 entertainment platforms around the world.
