Key Points:
- Frndly TV now comes pre-installed on new Roku devices and is integrated into Roku’s Live TV guide, boosting its visibility to users.
- Roku’s $75 million acquisition of Frndly TV contributed 1.8 points to its Q2 platform revenue growth.
- Roku is exploring ways to bundle Frndly TV with other streaming services in the near future.
Frndly TV has joined The Roku Channel as a default app that automatically appears when a customer buys and installs a new Roku streaming device or smart TV, company executives confirmed this week.
During a conference call to discuss Roku’s second quarter (Q2) financial results, the company’s Chief Financial Officer Dan Jeddah said the decision to make Frndly TV a default app on new Roku devices helped boost the visibility of the low-cost cable TV alternative.
Roku also integrated Frndly TV’s live channels into the company’s Live TV guide, which gave the app greater visibility among new and existing Roku device users alike, Jeddah confirmed.
“We’re very pleased with what we’re seeing with Frndly so far,” Jeddah affirmed.
In May, Roku announced it was acquiring Frndly TV for $75 million. The service charges around $8 per month to access live cable channels and national broadcast networks from A+E Global Media, Hallmark Media, the E. W. Scripps Company, Weigel Broadcasting, Allen Media Group and Sony, among others.
Frndly TV offers three programming tiers, with the availability of channels remaining the same. Customers can pay a few more dollars per month to get access to high-definition feeds, more simultaneous streams and a longer time period during which shows and movies are saved in their cloud-based DVRs.
Executives at Roku said the acquisition of Frndly TV had an immediate impact on platform revenue, contributing to around 1.8 points of growth. During Q2, Roku earned $975 million in platform revenue, which mainly consists of advertising and subscriptions.
On the call, Roku CEO Anthony Wood said the company is looking at ways to bundle Frndly TV with other streaming services.
“The bundles include technical capabilities, product capabilities, but also deals and commercial relationships,” Wood said. “We’re working on all of that and that’s improving…w e’re definitely looking at doing different kinds of bundling and adding more content, creating more packages around Frndly [TV].”
One move Roku isn’t considering is making Frndly TV exclusive to the platform. Frndly TV remains widely available on other streaming hardware, including those powered by Amazon’s Fire OS, Apple’s tvOS and Android TV, among others.
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