Streaming has increased its share of viewing time in U.S. households by 6% in the third quarter compared to a year ago, according to a new report from Vizio’s Inscape data unit.

The share of viewing time spent streaming has increased to 55.9% from 46% since Q3 2021, Inscape said, while cable and satellite’s share has fallen from 44.3% to 34.9%. 

At the same time, the number of native streaming apps installed on smart TV sets in households has more than doubled to 5.4 apps.

The share of viewers who only stream content has risen to 54% from 45% at the end of 2021.

Inscape notes that for marketers, this means 54% of smart TV viewers, who make up 65% of smart-TV viewing time, are not reachable by traditional cable, satellite or over-the-air advertising.

Brands should prioritize diversification across marketing efforts, especially given that most streaming platforms are experimenting with ad-supported tiers, the Inscape report said.

While a lot of attention has focused on cord-cutting and cord-nevers, Inscape also notes that many people who still subscribe to pay TV spend nearly all of their time watching streaming content.

Inscape calls these households “quiet quitters” and found that in Q3, 5.7% of cable and satellite subscribers who didn’t watch cable and satellite programming rose to 5.7% from 5.3% in Q2.

Meanwhile, the percentage of smart-TV owners who both stream and watch content via cable and satellite is dwindling, down to 41% in Q3 from 46% in 2021. 

In Q3 2023, 94% of total streaming time was driven by viewers who only (64.6%) or mostly (29%) streamed on their smart TVs.

Still bucking the streaming trends are sports and news.

Inscape found that 76.7% of sports viewing and 81.8% of news viewing were still occurring on traditional TV.

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Already a dominant supplier of TVOS in North America via its OEM relationships with TV manufacturers, Roku has unveiled two new product lines of its own branded smart TVs.

Set to hit the market in the spring, the Roku Select and Plus Series TVs will include 11 HD and 4K models, spanning screen sizes of 24 - 75 inches and ranging in price from $119 - $999.

Roku is unveiling its new smart TVs at CES 2023 in Las Vegas this week. The company also flew in a small cadre of tech and business journalists, Next TV included, to its San Jose, Calif. headquarters in early December to give a quiet overview of its new smart TV product lines.

All 11 models will feature a Roku voice remote, with higher end "Plus Series" models featuring the rechargeable Roku Voice Remote Pro device. Plus Series models will also include other nifty features, such as ambient light sensors.

Roku is also unveiling the latest iteration of its reference designs for smart TVs, this one focused on OLED. These are schematics upon which Roku's smart TV original equipment manufacturer (OEM) partners build sets based on the Roku operating system.

Roku, however, didn't disclose the name of the manufacturing partner for its new line of Roku-branded smart TVs.

Also read: Roku (Not Surprisingly) Mulls Building Its Own Smart TVs

The introduction of Roku-branded sets had been anticipated, especially with rivals including Amazon already in the market with their own branded smart TVs for over a year.

'Purpose Built'

As reporters engaged in presentations by numerous Roku team leaders at the company's San Jose HQ, Ken Krakow, director of hardware engineering for Roku, perhaps summed up the impetus for the new proprietary smart TV products best: "This allows us to strategically invest in new features," he said.

Roku has had its "TV program" in place since 2014, and is now engaged with 15 OEM partners including KTC, TCL, HKC, Hisense, Philips, Walmart's .onn brand, Sharp, RCA, Westinghouse, JVC, Hitachi and InFocus, among others. For the past eight years, these manufacturers have built sets based on Roku reference designs, which allow them to use relatively minimal computer hardware to run the "purpose-built" Roku TVOS on their products.

Also read: Roku Enters the Smart Home Biz

A third of the sets sold in North America today are powered by Roku's TVOS. Roku is currently engaged in a fierce battle in Europe, where the TVOS market is more wide open.

Indeed, the TV gateway platform business, as it's also known, is highly competitive. Most of Roku's OEM partners also build sets powered by rival OS systems from Google and Amazon, among other software tech suppliers.

Meanwhile, Roku has other peripheral product lines that rely on its TVOS, ranging from audio devices like smart sound bars to the company's new line of smart home products.

Having engineering control of the master device (i.e. the smart TV) better enables Roku to holistically manage and market its broader tech product portfolio.

In terms of go-to-market strategy, think end caps in retail destinations like Walmart, with Roku audio and smart home peripherals sold side by side with the new Roku-branded TVs. Or maybe bundled product offerings.

Still Committed to Its OEMs

Roku stressed that it remains "committed" to its smart TV OEMs, and is publishing its "OLED Reference Design" to support them.

Since 2014, Roku has published 11 reference designs, instructing OEM partners on how to build Roku-powered sets using 2K, 4K and 8K resolutions. The new spec outlines build guidelines for smart TVs using the Organic Light-Emitting Diode display technology.

Roku says its OLED Reference Design will help its partners cost-effectively build sets with "inky black levels, outstanding contrast, highly saturated colors, smooth motion and superior viewing angles."

A New Spoke in the Wheel

Roku reported 65.4 million active users for its TVOS platform as of the end of September -- a figure that's grown mainly by adoption of smart TVs into homes that previously didn't use Roku.

Entry into a new line of gadgets comes as Roku continues to bleed money in its hardware operation. It lost $17.5 million in the third quarter, holding the line on pricing for streaming sticks and pucks, as well as other gadgets, amid sustained pressure from global supply chain issues. (Roku's third-quarter metrics can be viewed here.)

Maintaining price integrity is crucial to sustaining unit sales of Roku devices ... which propels user growth and expansion of Roku's core business, selling ads.

Billing Roku as the next Netflix less than 18 months ago, Wall Street is now highly dissonant to the company, trading its shares at around 1/8th of the price they were valued at back in July 2021.

Any perceived growth deceleration in Roku's active user base or its ad revenue has only served to perpetuate the sustained downward cycle of Roku's Nasdaq fortune.

However, touring Roku's HQ on that blustery San Jose Wednesday on December 7, the team of veteran technologists seemed impervious to the current state of their employer's market capitalization.

They continue to build a complex web of gadgets, software and entertainment content, aiming to create a diversified video streaming business with dominant market share not only in North America, but in Europe and other global hot spots.

With the introduction of branded smart TVs, Roku has yet another tool to keep building out that agenda. ■

Sales of global smart TVs, weakened as the supply of LCD panels has been hit hard by pandemic-related supply issues, should rise by nearly 2% this year, according to Kagan, a media research unit of S&P Global Market Intelligence.

The return of LCD supplies, coupled with increases in residential broadband penetration which Kagan claims has opened the addressable smart TV market, should add to growth.

In a research note, Kagan said global smart TV shipments should rise 1.9% by the end of this year to 153 million units. The researcher forecasts that compound annual growth rates (CAGR) for smart TVs should increase to 2.3% from 2021 to 2026.

Also: Inflation Pushes 2022 Streaming Device Shipments Down, Kagan Says

“Despite a weak first quarter for global smart TV shipments, declining panel prices and the coming World Cup in November 2022 are expected to overcome the negative effects of inflation to spark consumer demand by the end of 2022,” Kagan said in its report, adding that while supply issues remain for some LCD panel components, the overall supply for TV displays is improving.

Consumer-electronics giant Samsung first rolled out the Samsung TV Plus streaming app of video channels in 2015, at a time when Tubi and Pluto TV were independent startups just beginning to explore a nascent and unproven market for free, ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) services that emulate the traditional TV experience.

Originally conceived as a video rental platform, the service quickly pivoted to the free ad-supported model seen today, currently delivering more than 200 video channels. Samsung has been including the app on its Tizen-based smart TVs since 2016. 

In September 2020 the service rolled out on select Samsung Galaxy mobile devices and tablets in the U.S. In April 2021, the company brought the service to mobile devices and tablets in Europe.

In June 2021, the company took another big leap forward with the introduction of a web version of Samsung TV Plus, opening it up to a wider audience and moving into direct competition with the likes of Tubi, Pluto TV, The Roku Channel and now Redbox Live TV in the burgeoning FAST space.

The web version is currently only available in the U.S. and South Korea. Like the TV and mobile apps, it’s free of charge to users. Users don’t even have to sign up for an account, although doing so unlocks personalization features like favorites lists, “continue watching,” watchlists and reminders. 

Users can move seamlessly across devices from TV to mobile to the web to enjoy their content without missing a beat.

Also: Channel-Flipping Makes a Comeback

Recent Samsung TV Plus Updates

Michael Cardullo, principal product manager for Samsung TV Plus, gave an update on the service at the company’s recent developers’ conference. He reported that the service is installed on nearly 200 million devices worldwide. 

“People are watching TV more than ever before and this new golden age of TV is all about streaming,” he said. “In the U.S., 63% of viewing on Samsung smart TVs is now streaming and a significant percentage of that viewing is happening on Samsung TV Plus.” 

“Samsung TV Plus is one of the top-performing apps on our smart TV platform across all categories and has doubled the number of monthly active users over the last year,” Cardullo added. “We've increased our channel lineup to over 1,200 channels across 23 countries.”

In the United States the channels number over 200. Recent additions include Electric Distribution’s ElectricNow, featuring action/adventure, sci-fi and fantasy fare including former TNT series Leverage and The Librarians; as well as the Samsung-owned channels The Hotel Inspector and Plated, a cooking channel featuring Gordon Ramsay and other top chefs. They joined the Samsung TV Plus lineup in June. 

In May, Samsung used its upfront to announce a quartet of new topic-based, ad-supported channels focused on cooking, autos, home and holidays. Studio Gunpowder & Sky launched a channel based on its horror-themed Alter service on Samsung TV Plus in April. 

T2, a youth-oriented spinoff of Sinclair Broadcast Group’s Tennis Channel, became Samsung TV Plus’s first live sports offering in March. Also that month, it added Antiques Roadshow U.K., an always-on stream from the BBC featuring episodes from the British iteration of Antiques Roadshow, hosted by Fiona Bruce.  Sinclair’s streaming news service NewsON, which provides coverage from nearly 200 broadcasters in more than 100 U.S. markets, joined the Samsung smart-TV lineup in January. 

As with other FAST offerings, the channel lineup features plenty of niche fare like The Design Network, The Dove Channel, Stories by AMC Plus and Drama Life along with channels devoted to a single show, like The Baywatch Channel, The Walking Dead Universe and a Hell’s Kitchen channel.

“The big news is news itself,” according to Cardullo. “Samsung TV Plus now has the most extensive premium news offering of any free, ad-supported TV service.” Live news streams are available from the major national broadcasters ABC, NBC and Fox, as well as local news, along with Newsy, Bloomberg QuickTake, Altice USA’s Cheddar and USA Today.

While the big networks still keep a stranglehold on big sporting events like the Super Bowl, college basketball’s March Madness and the NHL Stanley Cup playoffs, Samsung TV Plus offers a lineup of sports channels that includes beIN Sports Xtra, Fubo Sports Network, Pac-12 Insider and the ACC Digital Network.

Samsung TV Plus also supports 4K channels like Clarity 4K and Love Nature 4K.

Categories of channels include news & opinion, entertainment, crime, game shows, sports, food, home and travel, reality, Latino, international, comedy, gaming, kids, science and nature, sci-fi and horror, movies and music — covering just about every genre.

Samsung TV Plus Integrated in Samsung TVs

The service is tightly integrated into the program guide on Samsung’s smart TVs displaying TV Plus content alongside broadcast programming, allowing users to jump right in and start watching. 

The mobile app also supports screen-mirroring and Chromecast so viewers can cast from their phone to the TV, which opens it up to users who have a Samsung phone, but not a Samsung TV. 

Samsung unveiled a new version of its Tizen OS at January’s CES in Las Vegas despite being urged by some gadget mavens to ditch the proprietary system in favor of the Google-owned Android TV, which would bring the sets in line with Samsung’s Android-powered smartphones. The update included a new “Media Screen” that Samsung said is meant to “put all of your streaming content into one easy-to-browse place.” 

Samsung also said it would embed its Samsung Gaming Hub, a cloud gaming app, into its line of smart TVs, switching on support for the product in some 27 countries starting June 30. Samsung TV users will gain access to more than 100 games from the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate library, but they’ll need a subscription to play. 

Terry Ho, who heads media operations and curation for Samsung TV Plus, explained that the company works with a variety of video distribution platforms to on-board linear channels and on-demand content, giving content owners the flexibility to select a vendor that suits their needs.

The company also works with individual channel partners to help mimic the traditional TV experience. “Once this process begins, we work closely with content owners on stream configuration, ad tag implementation, metadata mapping, and even channel logo formatting to ensure high-quality standards are maintained throughout our channel offerings,” Ho said.

The company helps convert originating feeds to formats that stream best across TV, mobile and the web, relying on HVEC (H.265) compression to save on CDN bandwidth costs. Samsung’s quality assurance processes cover video encoding quality, caption sync, program metadata and ad insertion. 

“As we continue to grow, we also continue to optimize components of our FAST ecosystem to work seamlessly with the Samsung device platform, providing a single source of content input that delivers to multiple devices and territories to ensure a full pipeline of rich content offering to our viewers,” Ho said. 

According to Samsung TV Plus engineer Jinju Lim, recent behind-the-scenes updates have made the platform more scalable and flexible, enabling the company to take a modular approach to updating without having to update the entire platform. 

“Now we are also able to reorganize various channels and content more accurately and more quickly than ever,” she said. “We also built an extensive data analytics pipeline for TV Plus, so we can provide content with better quality of experience for our users.”

Advertising on Samsung TV Plus

Andrew Dickerson, Samsung TV Plus principal engineer, explained that in addition to working with all the major ad-insertion platforms, Samsung has its own global server-side ad insertion platform that helps partners monetize their content and offers the ability to split ad inventory. Samsung TV Plus offers a full suite of services, including ad routing, CDN, content hosting, channel playout and analytics.

Dickerson said that the platform has delivered billions of ads across hundreds of channels. 

“One of our most recent tech launches is local channels where our servers leverage the viewer’s region and designated market areas to determine the appropriate local weather and local news feeds to show,” he said. 

And of course, the same technology can be used for highly targeted advertising. 

For an electronics behemoth with $63 billion in Q3 revenue in 2021, a free streaming service might tend to get lost in the financial reports, but ads and services revenues are projected to grow dramatically over the next five years. 

According to a recent report from TV[R]EV, ad revenue for the three biggest U.S. smart TV OEMs — Samsung, LG and Vizio — is expected to see 4.5 times growth over the next five years, from $1.37 billion in 2021 to $6.17 billion in 2026.

And while subscription-based services like Netflix and Disney Plus face constant churn, as viewers binge on the latest hit and then churn away, free services are always there as soon as you turn on the TV, waiting to fill the void, while offering advertisers a highly targeted platform to get their message out. ■

The major smart TV makers who supply their own operating system will eventually give up and license a third-party OS from either Roku, Amazon or Google, Roku CEO Anthony Wood said. 

Speaking Monday at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom Conference, Wood said the streaming OS business would someday resemble the operating platform paradigm for smart phones, where Google's Android and Apple's iOS dominate a narrow field of OS contenders. 

More and more, it's the native OS of the smart TV that drives connected TV viewing, Wood said. And the platforms powering these TVs will consolidate over time.

Also read: Roku Ready To Make Streaming Pitch to In-Person NewFront

"We still have a lot of people using Samsung, LG and Vizio, but over time, they're going to switch to licensing third-party operating systems," Wood said. 

"The economics of monetization, feature sets and the resources just don’t support [an over-abundance] of solutions for streaming OS," he added. 

With more than 60 million active accounts, Roku is the leading supplier of connected TV OS in the U.S., which Wood called "an advanced market." 

As Roku has proliferated to markets like Mexico, it has quickly grown its market share, he added, noting that Roku has gone from zero to 20% market share of connected TVs in Mexico in just a few years. 

Operating systems including Samsung's Tizen and LG's webOS are big in regions like Western Europe, Wood noted, but that's only because Roku is just starting to deploy itself there. "Once Roku enters a market outside the U.S., our share starts to grow," he added. 

Eventually, the ad-supported side of the streaming business may get to a point in which OS providers scale of certain degree that is "big enough to ride the ride." But in the here and now, it seems hard to believe that Samsung, LG and Vizio would just give up. 

Samsung said last year that its Tizen OS is in 1.28 billion devices worldwide. And last week, Vizio said that active accounts for its SmartCast OS grew by 24% in 2021 to reach 15.1 million globally. ■

Years ago, Reed Hastings predicted that the migration from traditional broadcast to streaming would happen at an annual rate of six percent. 

This was at odds with both supporters and proponents of streaming formats. Streaming bulls adhered to the Silicon Valley myth that TV was already falling apart due to a “massive wave of cord cutting.” 

Yet most brands continued to pour money into traditional linear as it was still the only way for them to reach and create emotional connections with tens of millions of consumers at once.

TV Goes Digital

Turns out Hastings' prediction was pretty accurate. As more viewers turn to streaming or “connected TV" (CTV for short) they are finding a much broader array of options, from subscription apps to free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) apps. 

This presents a tricky situation for marketers who have difficulty straddling both CTV and linear TV. While both formats are valuable, particularly when used in tandem, the pathways to buy, plan, and measure across both platforms can be hard to navigate. 

Part of the problem is the question of responsibility. The structural systems set up even three years ago on the buy and sell side include digital teams, TV teams and offshoots like advanced TV. Now, this bifurcation has resulted in imaginary fences and organizational obstacles to work through. 

We hear it from brands all the time — they just want a cohesive, holistic TV investment strategy. Not a complicated terrain that pigeon holes them, or excuses why they can’t have the widest reach AND the smartest audience buying strategy. 

Fortunately, there’s a solution on the horizon that will allow advertisers to take advantage of both streaming and linear TV without fragmentation — the smart TV.

The Smart TV Revolution

Smart TV penetration is expected to reach 70% of TV households by the end of 2021. 

And this rapid adoption of smart TVs presents a huge opportunity to unify the entire landscape to one where all TV will be connected. At its core, this means every ad will be a CTV ad — with all the targeting, tracking, and optimizing promises across linear, broadcast, apps, AVOD services, you name it.

That’s right, every ad that hits the glass of a connected TV can and will be addressable.

This will be a win-win-win for everyone. Consumers will get a more customized experience. Advertisers will see better performance on their campaigns. Programmers will be able to deliver a more personalized approach to consumers that generates more engagement.

What’s It Going to Take?

Nearly everyone in the ad industry is bullish on a future where TV advertising is this dynamic, where software makes selling more efficient, and where algorithms deliver ads with the same kind of precision we enjoy on Instagram.

But there’s a reason addressable TV has never gotten much past a $3 billion category, despite the promise. It’s clunky, opaque, and designed only for experts. 

Advertisers like simple, fluid, and liquid markets. After all, anybody can buy ads on Facebook or Google, which is a big reason why anybody and everybody does.

But the technology to solve this is already here. We really can't use the "clunky" excuse anymore. With the rise of smart TVs, pretty much every form of television viewing is now connected to the internet, whether a person is "streaming" or not. And with ACR technology, companies can actually "see" when ad breaks are coming and swap out ads with something more targeted. 

Yet media owners remain at best cautious, and at worst reluctant, to commit fully to the format. This is somewhat understandable, for two reasons. First, many are still stinging from the commoditization of their inventory shortly after they first leaned into automation for the programmatic display market. Now we’re talking about higher CPMs for the most impactful advertising medium there is, where they already have infrastructure built and content deployed. 

Second, and perhaps more impactful, is that no common currency for measuring effectiveness of advertising across screens and platforms. Sure, it’s all measurable. But cross-platform benchmarks and standards are needed to provide the proper context.

But the CTV infrastructure is already maturing rapidly, with solutions for things like creative versioning and deduplication already in place. Media owners have also seen what a data driven approach does for consumers who get more value from data driven platforms — Netflix, Facebook, Spotify, Amazon all have data driven backbones.

Of course, nothing lights a fire like brands demanding change. I’m confident that as big marketers get a taste of what CTV can really offer, and how it will improve their business, they’ll keep pushing for more. 

And all TV will just become CTV. ■

Fox Entertainment said its Tubi streaming service is now available via LG Smart TV sets in the U.S., Canada, Mexico and Australia.

Tubi is now available on 29 different platforms, the most of any ad supported video on demand service, according to Fox. 

LG set users can access Tubi through the Launcher Bar on LG’s menu screen. It is also accessible by saying “Tubi” into the LG Magic Remote. Tubi programming is being integrated into the LG on-device search.

Tubi provides a library of 35,000 movies and television series including the original humor series The Freak Brothers.

Fox acquired Tubi last year and has seen strong growth in usage and ad revenue. ■

DistroTV said it has reached deals making its free ad-supported TV platform available on smart TVs produced by Samsung, LG and Sony.

DistroTV was already available via key streaming device partners including Amazon Fire TV, Roku, Apple TV, and Google TV, as well as on mobile platforms like iOS and Android.

With CTV mushrooming, it was important for DistroTV to get more smart TV carriage.

“Our research shows that DistroTV viewership is on average occurring at a 15-times higher engagement rate on large screen devices versus mobile devices,” said Navdeep Saini, co-founder and CEO of DistroScale, parent company of DistroTV. “We’re thrilled to expand DistroTV’s video streaming experience through our new availability on these smart TVs, and to continue to provide our growing base of viewers with the content they crave, on the devices they prefer to watch on.” 

DistroTV says it has a lineup of 150 channels, having added several over the past few months in an effort to appeal to a broader audience.

Comcast's Xfinity Flex product, launched in 2019 to attract broadband-only customers to on-demand and SVOD video offerings, may have missed its biggest opportunity by being late to the streaming game, but could still more than double its subscriber base by 2025, according to Bernstein media analyst Peter Supino.

In a research note, Supino estimated that Flex, which is available to Comcast broadband-only customers at no extra cost and offers more than 10,000 free movies and shows, access to apps like Netflix, Disney Plus, Amazon Prime and Hulu, as well as on-demand pay-per view content, has about 1.9 million active monthly users. That base could have been four times that amount if it had launched earlier in the streaming cycle, Supino estimated, but the analyst still believes the service could grow to about 5.6 million monthly active users over the next four years.

“Had Comcast been early with Flex, we think it would presently serve 6-8 million homes rather than its current [less than] 2 million monthly active users,” Supino wrote, adding that while the service is competitive, it’s not superior to other services. “However, Flex should continue to gain market share, however quietly, by targeting cancelling Xfinity video subscribers who keep Xfinity Internet service, as well as the minority of new Internet subscribers who have neither an SMD nor a recent vintage smart TV.”  

Supino predicts that the shift toward streaming video will continue over the next few years, with streaming media devices (SMDs) from Roku, Amazon, Google and Apple, connected TVs and smart TVs dominating the distribution sector.  

In his note, Supino estimated that of an estimated 117 million internet households in 2025, 100 million will be connected via SMDs or connected TVs. The rest, he wrote, will access entertainment via tablets, laptops and smartphones.

Those 17 million households, coupled with an estimated 10% of existing broadband households (about 10 million homes) that may experiment with a new service  and 4 million non-broadband, non-TV households in the footprint gives Flex a potential pool of about 31 million customers to mine. Taking into consideration Comcast’s existing broadband market share of about 24.2% and assuming 50% usage/uptake rate, Flex could add about 3.7 million customers at the low-end, and 4.8 million additions on the high end.

“With the ~3.7M potential net adds, Comcast can expect to have ~5.6M users by 2025,” Supino wrote, adding that with an estimated ARPU of about $45, Flex could earn annual revenue of around $250 million by 2025.

Supino also believes that Flex can help Comcast’s Peacock streaming service as a promotional tool.

“The cost of promotion on Flex should be vastly lower than in third party environments in which Peacock competes with larger streaming players for sign-ups and engagement,” he wrote. “For example, we believe that Roku gained a 10% share of Peacock's advertising inventory in the companies' 2020 carriage negotiation.” 

Smart TV penetration into North American households will meet and surpass 90% by 2024, according to data just released by Strategy Analytics. 

The research company said that more than 665 million homes worldwide, around 34%, owned a smart TV at the end of 2020. This figure is set to increase to 1.1 billion homes globally, or 51%, by 2026. 

“Smart TV is a standard fit feature of most flat-panel TVs sold today and so smart TV household penetration will inevitably continue to grow as consumers replace old sets with new modern smart-enabled versions,” said Edouard Bouffenie, senior analyst, connected home devices, for Strategy Analytics. 

Notably, the research company said Korea's Samsung, which makes its own operating system, remains the top shipper of internet-connected televisions worldwide. However, China's TCL--which licenses Roku for many of the sets it ships--has usurped Korea's LG for the No. 2 position globally. 

“Smart TV usage is growing and is on a path towards becoming the preferred platform for accessing online video content,” added David Watkins, VP, media and intelligent home practice for Strategy Analytics. “However, the current connected TV landscape in the home is incredibly complex and consumers may have multiple devices in multiple configurations to choose from. Factor in different viewing habits amongst different members of the household and it’s clear that TV streaming platform providers face a significant challenge in driving engagement and ensuring that TV viewers remain on their platform and do not switch to another source. Smart TV OS providers must look to influence the TV viewer’s journey through improved content discovery capabilities, advanced analytics and advertising platforms and the development of an intuitive and user-friendly UI.”

In an increasingly complicated media environment, Nielsen officially announced it will be adding data from 55 million set-top boxes and smart TVs to its national TV currency, allowing it to measure addressable advertising.

The move is one of several Nielsen told customers it would be making at its national client meeting last month.

Also Read: Nielsen Sheds Unit as It Gears Up for Big Data

The addition of big data to Nielsen's national TV measurement will enable critical elements of its advanced TV strategy, which also includes measurement of connected TV (CTV) apps and devices. Nielsen intends to deliver holistic, cross-media metrics across all premium video.

Nielsen will also be expanding its streaming ratings to provide daily data on a bigger group of services, including ViacomCBS’s Pluto TV and Fox’s Tubi. And it will be rolling out reports to give advertisers more information about the diversity of programming they might be sponsoring.

Also Read: Comscore Nears Deal with Anchor Investor

More advertisers are looking to use data to target ads at specific consumers and technology is allowing distributors to address ads to individual households and devices. In order for the addressable advertising business to scale, industry executives have been looking for more granular measurement than the panel of 40,000 Nielsen families can provide.

With the additional data, Nielsen will be measuring addressable campaigns being delivered by AT&T’s DirecTV, Dish and Nielsen Advanced Advertising, plus campaigns on Vizio sets using the open addressable standard developed by the Project OAR consortium.

Nielsen expects to make preview data available in the first half of 2021. The data will show how many people in the target audience saw an ad addressed specifically to them. It will also count the remaining viewers during that commercial slot who saw a different ad delivered as part of the traditional linear feed. 

For now, Nielsen will continue to use C3 and C7, which measure the average of the commercial minutes within a program. But it has told clients it is working on delivering exact commercial ratings for each individual spot.

“As TV continues to become more digital in nature, there is greater demand for comprehensive independent measurement of reach and frequency that’s scaled across linear and advanced TV,” said Scott Brown, GM of audience measurement at Nielsen. “Addressable TV advertising can only scale if media buyers and sellers can monetize those impressions. By marrying big data with Nielsen’s high-quality panels, we can ensure all metrics are representative, accurate and trusted. This is a critical first step to help scale addressability and lay the foundation for a holistic cross media measurement system.”  

Nielsen said the new measurement system will provide more demographic and exposure measurement by incorporating the new data sources and calibrating them against its panels to correct for bias and provide more granular person level insights.

Also Read: Cable Adds a Playbook to Addressable Ad Push

DirecTV and Dish have been offering addressable advertising for some time.

“This expansion of our relationship could not come at a more important time for the industry,” said Rick Welday, executive VP and general manager, AT&T Broadband and Video. “The combination of our expertise and leadership in addressable advertising with Nielsen’s decades of experience as the backbone of TV measurement will unlock the power of National Addressable TV. It is a win for national TV networks, a win for integrity in measurement, and most importantly, a win for advertisers.”

“Nielsen has been a strategic partner of Dish Network for several years and we’re excited to expand this relationship to give advertisers and programmers the option to reliably measure addressable campaigns that leverage our data and tech stack,” said Kemal Bokhari, Dish Media general manager of data & analytics. “We continue to advocate for innovation and collaboration across the industry, and this is a great step toward that vision.”

Also Read: iSpot Measures Addressable Ads Under Project OAR Specs

Vizio and other smart TV makers have been both selling data about viewing behavior as well as selling advertising to marketers looking to reach the growing number of over-the-top streaming viewers. Vizio led the formation of Project OAR, which aims to develop open standard for addressable advertising. 

“The goal from the outset of OAR has been to help the industry rapidly evolve the technology and infrastructure to make linear advertising more responsive and relevant to the interests of the viewer while giving inventory owners and brands a better value proposition for TV on the whole,” said Adam Gaynor, VP of network partnerships and head of addressable at Vizio. “We are encouraged that Nielsen is making the investment to measure addressable advertising at scale as it will accelerate industry adoption and ultimately provide a better experience to viewers at home.”

Hollywood’s biggest filmmakers and studios don’t like what the motion smoothing feature in modern Ultra High Definition (UHD) TVs is doing to their films. And with the help of trade group the UHD Alliance, they’ve banded together and convinced leading consumer electronics makers to create a feature that automatically turns off motion smoothing for movies.

On Tuesday, shortly after the UHD Alliance hosted a star-studded press event to announce the coalition in Los Angeles, Vizio said that it would enable the so-called “Filmmaker Mode” in its 2020 smart TV collection.

LG and Panasonic have also committed to support the standard, which is designed as to not require the user to enter menu settings. Filmmaker Mode can be triggered automatically by metadata in the content, or manually via a dedicated button on the remote. 

“Current TVs use advanced video processing capabilities to offer consumers a broad range of options in viewing various types of content, ranging from sports to video games,” reads a press release issued by the UHD Alliance, a coalition of 4K technology stakeholders. “Filmmaker Mode will allow viewers to enjoy a more cinematic experience on their UHD TVs when watching movies by disabling all post-processing (e.g. motion smoothing, etc.) so the movie or television show is displayed as it was intended by the filmmaker, preserving the correct aspect ratios, colors and frame rates.”

The UHD Alliance attached a gaggle of big-name Hollywood directors to its initiative, including Paul Thomas Anderson, Ryand Coogler, Patty Jenkins, Martin Scorsese and Christopher Nolan. Executives from Universal Pictures and Amazon Prime Video were also quoted in the coalition’s press release.

“Most people today are watching these classic films at home rather than in movie theaters, making Filmmaker Mode of particular importance when presenting these films which have specifications unique to being shot on film,” Scorsese said in the announcement. 

Of all the TVs in U.S. households, 32% are now connected smart TVs, according to the latest Leichtman Research report, “Connected and 4K TVs 2019.”

For companies like Amazon and Roku, that figure highlights the urgency of signing deals with Asian TV manufacturers and getting “pole position” on the smart TV user interface.

In 2017, smart TVs accounted for just 24% of all TVs in U.S. homes; the figure was only 7% in 2014, Leichtman said.

Making the proposition less compelling: At this point only 14% of U.S. adults are watching video daily on a smart TV.

Overall, 74% of U.S. households have at least one internet-connected TV device, such as a smart TV, or an OTT player such as Roku, Amazon Fire TV or Apple TV. This was up from 69% in 2017 and 50% in 2014.

According to the research company’s survey of 1,150 U.S TV homes, 31% of U.S. adults watch video on a connected TV daily. Among pay TV subscribers, that figure is only 25%. It’s 49% for cord cutters.

Other Leichtman findings:

> 49% of U.S. TV homes have at least one stand-along streaming device, up from 40% in 2017.

> 22% of U.S. TV homes with annual incomes north of $50,000 have a 4K TV vs. 9% of households with income under $50K.

> 34% of U.S. households that received a TV within the last year have $4K HDTV.

“About three-quarters of all TV households in the U.S. now have at least one connected TV device, with a mean of 3.9 devices per connected TV household,” said Bruce Leichtman, president and principal analyst for Leichtman Research Group. “Over half of all adults watch video via a connected TV device at least weekly, an increase from one-quarter of adults five years ago, and nearly one-third of adults now use these devices daily."

Apple and Roku are reportedly close to finalizing a deal that will enable AirPlay 2 support in Roku devices.

This would let users of Roku streaming devices and Roku-powered smart TVs port videos, photos and music directly from iPhones, iPads, MacBooks and other Apple devices to the Roku user interface.

It’s a particularly big win for Roku’s bid to become the dominant operating system of smart TVs. As the Consumer Electronics Show got underway in January, Apple announced AirPlay 2 support for Samsung, LG, Vizio and Sony TVs—a deal thought to have put Roku at a significant disadvantage.

The Roku interface powers smart TVs made by TCL, Sharp, Hisense, Hitachi, Sanyo, and RCA. Those makers would be challenged to remain loyal to Roku if their rivals end up with AirPlay 2 support and they don’t.

Related: Roku Gets TCL's Backing in Smart TV Battle with Apple

After CES announcement, one investment firm called Roku’s stock “uninvestible.”

News of the Apple and Roku talks comes from MacRumors.

The two technology companies have yet to confirm the agreement. 

Nielsen has announced the acquisition of addressable ad tech company Sorenson Media out of bankruptcy, and simultaneously, a new commercial initiative targeting smart TVs.

Nielsen Advanced Video will focus on expanding and innovating addressable advertising on smart TVs, a platform that is increasingly important amid the migration of video consumption to over-the-top platforms. According to Statista, there are expected to be more than 250 million smart TVs deployed in the U.S. by 2023.

Nielsen purchased Sorenson in a bankruptcy-court proceeding with a winning $11.25 million bid, according to Variety.

Nielsen said it will combine the Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) technology, added to its portfolio through its acquisition of Gracenote two years ago, with Sorenson’s addressable TV ad platform. Integrated into the firmware layer of millions of Smart TVs, Gracenote’s ACR technology provides the ability for real-time, frame-level ad detection regardless of source or platform.

“It’s clear that a significant portion of TV advertising will be addressable long into the future,” said David Kenny, CEO of Nielsen, in a statement.

“With the continued evolution of our Total Audience measurement, underpinned by decades of trust, transparency and independence, it was evident that we needed to bring our unique set of technology assets and talent to tackle the greatest challenges the TV advertising industry is facing. And with the Sorenson Media acquisition, we can create improved value and efficiency across the entire media chain - from ad targeting and delivery to measurement and attribution - and make addressable TV more of a reality.”

Nielsen has scrambled to catch up as TV audiences have dispersed to digital platforms over the last decade. The research company has made a number of acquisitions to try to gird its tenuous position as the go-to shop for TV ad measurement in the digital age. This includes Qterics, a smart TV and privacy management company.

“We are excited to partner with others in the industry to make addressability a reality,” added Kelly Abcarian, general manager of Nielsen’s Advanced Video Advertising Group. “Nielsen has the experience and technology to help expand a scalable industry-wide, end-to-end addressable TV advertising solution. And, we can provide a measurement solution that innovates on current approaches with a bridge to the future.”

HBO said it has struck a deal to provide complimentary access to HBO GO, the premium programmer’s authenticated streaming service, to guests staying at select Marriott properties in the U.S.

Starting this month, guests in supported hotels will be able to access HBO GO on in-room connected TVs without having to log in with user names and passwords. HBO said the app will initially be made available to more than 1,500 Marriott properties and about 575,000 rooms, and a more than 3,500 properties over the next several months.

Complementary access to HBO in hotels has been a long-time perk in the hospitality industry, while also giving HBO exposure to non-subscribers. This new offering tied to HBO GO will got a step further by also delivering on-demand streaming access to HBO-licensed movies and its mix of original series, such as Game of Thrones, Westworld and Silicon Valley.

HBO said the Marriott agreement is the first for this particular offering, but added that its distribution team is working across the lodging industry to evolve in-room entertainment experiences with digital offerings such as HBO GO.

The HBO-Marriott pact is one of several announcements being made Monday amid The Hospitality Industry Technology Exposition & Conference, taking place this week in Houston.

RELATED: Comcast Business Tailors X1 for Hospitality Market

“Travelers today expect personalized experiences right down to guest room entertainment, being able to watch their favorite shows when they want to even on the road,” Scott Hansen, senior director of guest technology for Marriott International, said in a statement. “The addition of HBO GO demonstrates our ongoing commitment in expanding entertainment options while enhancing our guests’ travel experience.”

The number of U.S. TV homes with at least one internet-connected TV device continues to swing upward, Leichtman Research Group found in a new study.

Some 74% of those homes have at least one such device in a category that includes smart TVs, standalone streaming players, streaming adapters and sticks, and connected Blu-ray players, LRG said in the study, Connected and 4K TVs XV, which based findings on a survey of 1,202 U.S. TV homes.

The 2018 results are up from 65% in LRG’s 2016 study, 44% in 2013, and a mere 24% in 2010.

LRG said 29% of adults in U.S. TV homes watch video on a TV via a connected device daily, up from 19% in 2016, 6% in 2013, and 1% in 2010.

Tying into a broader trend that has seen younger viewers gravitate to OTT-delivered video, that group currently over-indexes in the 18-34 age group (43%), compared to 33% who are 35-54, and 12% among those 55 years or older.

Per the study, about 29% of all TVs in U.S. homes are connected smart TVs, up from just 7% in 2014. Among homes with any connected TV device, 57% have three or more, with a mean of 3.8 devices per connected TV home.

Across all TV homes, the mean number of connected TV devices is 2.8, versus a mean of 1.7 pay TV set-top boxes per U.S. TV home

“Connected TVs, along with Netflix and other SVOD services, are among the biggest factors driving change in the video industry over the past few years,” Bruce Leichtman, president and principal analyst for Leichtman Research Group, said in a statement. “In a short period of time, connected devices have allowed an increasing number of consumers to easily watch SVOD and other video options on the same TV screen as traditional pay-TV and broadcast offerings."

Roku’s business reached a milestone of sorts in Q1 as Platforms revenue exceeded Player-related revenue for the first time.

Q1 2018 revenue at Roku’s fast-growing Platforms division, which includes advertising, subscription revenue sharing and licensing fees from TV makers, jumped 106%, to $75.1 million, while Player-related revenue dipped 3%, to $61.5 million.

Total net revenue rose 36% to $136.6 million, with ARPU climbing 50%, to $15.07.

Active accounts were up 47%, to 20.8 million, while total streaming hours via Roku’s players and integrated Roku TVs reached 5.1 billion in Q1, up 56% versus the year-ago period.

Roku said roughly half of its base of active users have cut the cord or have never had a traditional pay TV subscription.

In its letter to investors, Roku stated a belief that “virtually every TV OEM will eventually need to license a TV OS, as consumers shift to smart TVs with 4K displays, and as OEMs focus on both cutting costs and boosting customer satisfaction.”

Two notable exceptions are Samsung (Tizen) and LG Electronics (webOS). Roku is continuing to focus on the smart TV market as it faces more competition in that area from Google’s Android TV and Amazon’s Fire TV platforms.

RELATED: Amazon, Best Buy Strike Exclusive Smart TV Deal

Roku said it expected retail distribution of Roku TV models to grow in 2018, and also raised its full year 2018 outlook.

Its TV partners include Funai Electric (Sanyo, Magnavox and Philips), RCA, TCL, Element Electronics, Hitachi America, Sharp, and Hisense.

Shares in Roku closed at $36.08 each Wednesday, up 8.94% ($2.96). Shares were up 2.27% in after-hours trading Wednesday night. 

In a deal that matches two retailing giants, Amazon and Best Buy have struck an exclusive multi-year deal to sell a line of Fire TV Edition smart TVs in the U.S. and Canada.  

Starting this summer, Best Buy plans to introduce more than 10 4K and HD Fire TV Edition models from Insignia (Best Buy’s in-house brand) and Toshiba. All will run the built-in Fire TV user interface/streaming platform that also builds in Amazon’s Alexa-powered voice navigation and smart home technology.  

The companies said Fire TV Edition smart TVs will be available exclusively in Best Buy stores, at BestBuy.com and, for the first time, via Best Buy as a third-party seller on Amazon.com.  

The deal will expand the reach of Amazon’s Fire TV Edition platform for TV makers, augmenting models made by TV making partners that include Westinghouse, Seiki and Element Electronics.  

RELATED: Fire TV Platform Roars Into Smart TV Market (subscription required)  

The Best Buy deal also shores up Fire TV’s positioning against competitors that have built their platforms into smart TVs, including Roku and Android TV, as well as home-grown smart TV platforms from Samsung (Tizen) and LG Electronics (webOS). 

RELATED: Sanyo Joins Roku TV Lineup 

“Amazon and Best Buy have a long history of working together, and today we take our partnership to a new level,” Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s founder and CEO, said in a statement. "These Fire Edition smart TVs by Insignia and Toshiba deliver beautiful visuals and all the movies and TV shows you love, with an experience that gets better every day with Alexa. We could not have a better partner in this endeavor.” 

Hubert Joly, Best Buy’s chair and CEO, added: “Our goal is to enrich the lives of our customers by offering them the very best products and services, whether they come to us online, visit our stores, or invite us into their homes. Our partnership with Amazon is exciting because we believe Fire TV Edition delivers an incredible user experience and further strengthens the growing connection between home theater, home automation and voice control.” 

Hulu has added a mix of new streaming platforms to its repertoire while also moving ahead with a new bundled offering with Spotify, the subscription music streaming service.  

On the device front, Hulu said its SVOD and live TV service is now supported on all 2017, 2018 and select 2016 LG Electronics webOS-powered TVs, as well as all 2018 Samsung TVs running Tizen, and two additional Roku devices – the Roku Streaming Stick (3500) and Roku 2 (4210X).  

Hulu’s new interface and live TV service is also supported on Apple TV (4th gen.), Amazon Fire TV devices, Roku devices, Xbox One, iOS and Android mobile devices, Nintendo Switch and Chromecast.  

Hulu’s mass market bundle with Spotify Premium runs $12.99 per month (with Hulu’s SVOD plan with limited commercials).  

To help prime the pump, existing Spotify Premium subs can get a 99 cent promotional offer to try Hulu’s limited commercial plan for three months.  

That mass market deal follows an earlier bundle that Hulu and Spotify made available to students starting last fall.  

“Based on the outstanding performance of the Spotify and Hulu student package, it’s clear that consumers love to combine their music and television experiences together,” Tim Connolly, SVP, and head of distribution and partnerships at Hulu, said in a statement. “Hulu and Spotify are brands that are defining how fans connect with entertainment in the future, and we are excited to expand our partnership to bring this combined package to all existing and new Spotify Premium subscribers.”

"Our student launch with Hulu was incredibly well received and we are excited to extend our reach by bringing Hulu to more of our Premium members in the US,” added Alex Norstrom, chief premium business officer at Spotify. “Hulu's TV content is highly acclaimed, and with this exclusive Spotify offer we are bundling two top media platforms for an unbeatable price. This is just one example of how we can add value to our premium members day after day." 

Showtime said it’s the first cable network to launch an app on LG Electronics smart TVs that run webOS.

The launch, which includes access on LG’s new 2018 OLED TVs and Super UHD TVs with AI ThinQ built-in, spans both Showtime’s standalone OTT service (called SHOWTIME and sold for $10.99 per month) as well as Showtime Anytime, its authenticated TV Everywhere service that is part of a pay TV subscription.

Showtime said its standalone OTT service, launched in July 2015, has well over 2 million subscribers.

The app launch on LG smart TVs expands on Showtime’s streaming reach on other platforms that include Samsung smart TVs, Roku, Apple and Amazon devices, and the Xbox One console. Showtime is also distributed by vMVPDs and digital partners such as Hulu, YouTube TV, Sling TV, DirecTV Now, PlayStation Vue, fuboTV and Amazon Channels.

In an important move that extends a bridge beyond its own streaming device ecosystem, Roku said The Roku Channel, its free, ad-supported VOD offering, is set to debut this summer on “select” Samsung smart TVs.

RELATED: Roku Launches its Own Free, Ad-Based Streaming Channel

Those models were not specified in today's announcement, but it's expected that they will include millions of smart TVs that run Samsung's Tizen operating system. 

The Roku Channel is a curated AVOD service that debuted last fall on Roku TVs and Roku players. The expansion on Samsung will extend the availability of The Roku Channel and possibly pave the way for further expansions to other streaming platforms that aren’t powered by the Roku OS.

Roku said The Roku Channel, which today features “hundreds” of movies and TV shows, is a top 20 channel on its own platform. Roku has previously said that it has also risen to be the number three ad-supported channel on its Roku platform, with Scott Rosenberg, GM of Roku’s Platforms business, calling it a “material contributor” to the video inventory that Roku sells during the company's recent earnings call.

Roku noted that The Roku Channel’s ad load per programming hour is about half as compared to traditional linear TV.

“By broadening our distribution of this app to other viewing platforms such as Samsung, the #1 TV maker in the U.S., we are able to engage millions more consumers with free ad-supported entertainment,” Rosenberg said, in a statement. 

CuriosityStream, the fact-based subscription VOD service created by Discovery Channel founder John Hendricks, said it has broadened its reach to certain Vizio SmartCast-branded smart TV models. 

CuriosityStream is initially rolling out its app to 2017 and 2017 Vizio SmartCast P-, M-, and E-Series Ultra HD models, which also support Chromecast built-in technology that enables users to cast content from the smartphone to the TV screen.  

CuriosityStream’s stand-alone OTT offering starts at $2.99 per month for a “Basic” standard-def tier, while Standard (which supports HD) runs $5.99, and its Premium tier, with access to the service’s 4K library, runs $11.99 per month.

The SVOD service, launched in March 2015, hasn’t disclosed any subscriber figures.

RELATED: Curious Behavior

The launch on Vizio continues CuriosityStream’s expansion onto various streaming platforms. Others include Roku, Apple TV, Xbox One consoles, Fire TV boxes, Chromecast, iOS and Android mobile devices, and smart TVs from Sony, LG Electronics and Samsung.

RELATED: Sling TV Pitches CuriosityStream as Premium Add-On

CuriosityStream has been complementing its own direct-to-consumer offering with distribution deals with MVPDs and other partners that include Comcast, Layer3 TV (now part of T-Mobile), Sling TV, Amazon Channels and VRV.  

Roku has hit back against a new Consumer Reports study finding that smart TVs from makers such as Samsung, LG Electronics, Sony, Vizio and TCL (which makes a line of Roku-powered TVs) are vulnerable to hackers, holding that they can be broken into to track what viewers are watching.

As USA Today notes, Consumer Reports said it was able to break into a TCL/Roku TV using a feature that Roku developed that enables remote use of a remote control on other platforms, including smartphones.

"What we found most disturbing about this, was the relative simplicity of," how easy it was to hack those products, Glenn Derene, Consumer Reports' senior director of content, told the publication.

Gary Ellison, Roku’s VP of trust engineering, posted a blog item holding that Consumer Reports “got it wrong,” at least with respect to how Roku's platform was characterized.

“This is a mischaracterization of a feature,” he wrote. “It is unfortunate that the feature was reported in this way. We want to assure our customers that there is no security risk.”

Ellison acknowledged that Roku enables outside developers to create remote control applications that consumers can use to control their Roku product using an open interface, and added that consumers also have the ability to turn off that feature.

He also said Roku’s support of ACR (automatic content recognition), another technology that Consumer Reports viewed as a vulnerability because it can be used to target ads, is an opt-in feature.

But, as USA Today rightly points out, data gathering practices and general privacy issues with smart TVs have been drawing scrutiny.

About a year ago, for example, Vizio agreed to pay $2.2 million to settle federal and state charges that millions of its connected TVs were collecting viewing data without the consumer’s knowledge or consent.

Extending its reach to a key smart TV platform, Nuvyyo, the company behind the Tablo-branded over-the-air DVRs for cord-cutters, has launched a native app for Samsung smart TVs that are powered by the Tizen operating system.

RELATED: Nuvyyo Cuts Price on Tablo Dual

With that launch, coming just ahead of the Winter Olympic Games in PyeongChang, Nuvyyo adds another major OS for smart TVs, expanding on earlier support for Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Android TV, and LG Electronics’ webOS.

The new app for Tizen-powered TVs (starting with Samsung 2015 model years) provides access to the Tablo’s content discovery platform, as well as live playback, and DVR functions via an interface that’s tailored for big screen TVs and works with the TV’s remote control.

A solid user experience is a top desire from consumers on smart TVs and TV-connected streaming devices, Parks Associates found its a new “Market Snapshot” study of that sector.

Per the study, navigation was a the top reason cited by consumers in terms of which attribute drives ease-of-use in in-home entertainment devices, edging out content discovery and ease of set up. Of less importance were the number of video formats supported, whether they work with PCs and other devices, and the level of customer service (see chart).

Updated:Parks Associates said most of the data in the snapshot comes from a Q1 2017 survey of about 10,000 people, which it used to draw its conclusions about UX becoming a key focus for smart TVs and streaming players. It also drew those conclusions in part to discussions with industry execs and the firm's own insight. 

 Parks Associates said 45% of U.S. broadband homes now have a smart TV, currently the most commonly used platform for those homes when it comes to accessing online video content.

Notably, 11% of U.S. broadband homes have a “strong intention” to buy a 4K/Ultra HD TV this holiday season, though overall device sales of flat-panel TVs have flattened out, noted Jennifer Kent, director of research quality and provide development at Parks Associates.

 “As a result, we are seeing new partnerships among device manufacturers focused on ways to improve or refresh the UI of the smart TV, to make the device easy to use and a single point of content in the living room,” she said.

Recent examples include Samsung’s integration of Amazon Music into its smart TVs, and new TV products from Philips that are powered by Roku’s OS.

RELATED: Philips Launches First Roku TV Model 

The study also found that more than 50% of U.S. broadband homes find voice control appealing for entertainment and smart home devices, and voice control for all devices, including TVs, security systems and appliances.

Hulu said its new UI and Live TV service is now available on 2017 Samsung smart TVs, which runs the Samsung Tizen OS.

Hulu users who watch on those Samsung models will be auto-upgraded the new Hulu platform, which also allows subscribers to create up to six individual profiles, Richard Irving, Hulu’s VP of product, noted in this blog post.

In addition to Hulu’s SVOD service and live TV service, launched in beta form in May, users on the updated app for Samsung TVs can also tack-on subscriptions to Showtime, HBO, and Cinemax, and upgrade to Hulu live TV’s Enhanced Cloud DVR or unlimited screens option.

Hulu has also launched its new interface and live TV offering on Apple TV (fourth gen), Amazon Fire TV devices, Roku devices, Xbox One consoles, the Nintendo Switch, iOS and Android mobile devices, along with support for Google Chromecast.

RELATED: Hulu Secures Streaming Beachhead on Nintendo Switch

YouTube TV used Twitter to announce that the OTT TV service has launched apps for select smart TVs from LG Electronics and Samsung.

YouTube TV has yet to outline all the specific detail, but it did point out in the tweets that, with respect to Samsung, that the service is available on 2016 and 2017 models. According to YouTube TV’s device support page, 2016 and 2017 models from LG also support the service.

That page also notes that YouTube TV will becoming available on Sony Linux-based TVs.

After starting on smartphones, tablets and web browsers, YouTube TV recently adds apps for several TV-connected platforms, including certain Android TV devices, and Xbox One consoles. YouTube TV also supports TVs with Chromecast built-in.

RELATED: YouTube TV Set to Connect With Android TV, Xbox One, Apple TV Devices

YouTube TV also has work underway to launch apps for Apple TV (complementing support for AirPlay) and the Xbox One X.

Element Electronics will start selling a Roku-powered TV with 4K and High Dynamic Range capabilities on November 27 at Walmart stores.

That model, which sports a 50-inch screen and supports HDR10, will integrate the Roku OS and interface, providing access to more than 5,000 apps/channels. The new Element Electronics model will get an update later this year for Roku OS 8, an updated operating system that features a “Smart Guide” component that blends OTT content and over-the-air TV.

Pricing on the new model was not announced. Element and Roku announced their partnership in January 2017.

Among other specs, the new Element TV has a refresh rate of 60Hz, up to 60 fps, built-in WiFi, three HDMI ports, plus composite and Ethernet ports, and two USB ports.

Element Electronics also makes TVs powered by Amazon’s Fire TV platform.

RELATED: Element Electronics Lights Preorders for Fire TV-Powered 4K TVs

Roku’s other TV manufacturing partners include Funai Electric, RCA, TCL, Hitachi America, Sharp, Insignia (Best Buy’s in-house brand), and Hisense.

Funai Electric is the latest TV maker to connect with Roku, as it plans to introduce Philips-branded models later this year that are powered by Roku’s OS/streaming platform.

Funai joins a growing list of TV makers that have joined the Roku TV licensing program, which is part of Roku’s fast-growing Platforms division that also factors in advertising and subscription revenue sharing. Other Roku TV partners include RCA, TCL, Element Electronics, Hitachi America, Sharp, Insignia (Best Buy’s in-house brand), and Hisense.

RELATED: Roku Shares Surge on Q3 Results

Funai has not announced pricing, screen sizes and whether 4K will be supported in its initial wave of Roku-powered TVs.

Roku also announced a Black Friday deal -- a $20 discount on its new Streaming Stick+. The model, which supports 4K and HDR, is being cut to $49.99. Though it’s billed as a Black Friday deal, this one gets started on November 22 (a Wednesday) at 9:01 p.m. PT, and runs through Monday, Nov. 27.

The Roku Express+, a model offered exclusively at Walmart, will also see “rollback pricing” during Black Friday weekend. That model, which supports HDMI and composite A/V ports (for older TVs without HDMI ports), usually sells for $39.99.

RELATED: Roku Freshens Up Streaming Device Lineup, Bows New OS

Roku has also teamed with DirecTV Now on a promo that offers one month of free service to DirecTV Now to customers who buy and activate a Roku device through Jan. 14, 2018.

Roku will be using the promo to bump its base of active users. It ended Q3 with 16.7 million active accounts, up by 48%, or 5.4 million, year-over-year.

After cutting its teeth on the Roku platform, Float Left, a privately held company founded in 2009 that specializes in developing and deploying TV apps, has extended a bridge to several other major streaming platforms. The list included Apple TV, mobile, smart TVs, Amazon Fire TV and Vewd (formerly known as Opera TV).

In addition to developing custom apps for major brands such as Crackle, NBC Sports and AMC, Float Left has also created a white-label TV apps product called Flicast that can help mid-tier brands and smaller players extend onto a growing ecosystem.

While the process of hitting all of those platforms has gotten easier, video publishers are still faced with a fragmented platform market that makes it a challenge to bring a high-performance “native” experience to all (or most) of them.

Related > TV Apps: The Last Mile

Multichannel News technology editor Jeff Baumgartner recently caught up with Float Left CEO Tom Schaeffer to discuss how those challenges are being overcome along with other trends that are affecting the multiscreen video sector. An edited transcript follows.

MCN: Let’s start with the name. What does Float Left refer to in the context of TV apps and your business?
Tom Schaeffer: Unfortunately, it really doesn’t. [Laughs.] When I founded the company, for a very brief time we were a web applications business. We were building web apps. Float Left is a reference to an HTML styling paradigm. It’s a way to lay out items on a web page. We were just sitting around and it was the least terrible name we could think of.

MCN: You develop on a bunch of platforms. Fragmentation has always been seen as a long pole in the tent. Is that still the case when it comes to the biggest tech or operational challenges faced by the industry today?
TS: For companies that are doing this what I’d argue is the right way, which is pure, native development for all of these different platforms, yes, [fragmentation] still presents a huge challenge. You do make up some ground with the smart TV ecosystem, where everything is based in HTML5. But for the platforms that are driving a lot of the ROI for the brand — Apple TV and Roku and [Amazon] Fire TV — those are absolutely independent platforms and require different code and different skill sets.

Part of the strategy we’ve put forth is we want to invest in native. Yes, it’s going to take longer, and yes, it’s going to be more of a technical challenge, but we know the end product and the result that the publishers get when they get that complete suite of apps. It’s an overall better experience. It’s easier for [the publishers] to manage, and it’s easier for us to manage on behalf of them.

We thought with the Smart TV Alliance that this was the first step in a unification of code to make the TV experience better, but really everyone is going in their own direction. And we don’t see that getting better, at least with respect to the platforms that matter to publishers today.

That’s what Flicast is … underneath that is a technology that helps to make this process manageable for us and for the publishers.

MCN: So we’re not yet at a point where it’s code once, deploy everywhere, because there are still enough nuances between these platforms?
TS: If you’re doing one code and you’re deploying everywhere, you’re not truly going native. That does impact performance at the end of the day. From our perspective, it’s still very fragmented. We’re not at a place now, and I don’t think we’ll ever be at a place, where you hit a button and it kind of goes everywhere. It’s more managed in frameworks and tools that we’re developing underneath the surface.

MCN: What platform is the most grueling to develop for in terms of certification? Do they all represent a degree of pain?
TS: They all definitely have their own degree of pain at certain times. Roku certainly has been a challenge. You’d sometimes have a brand that was developed on Apple TV with a rich experience here, but they also love Roku. We would have to build our own screens and make it do things that it wasn’t initially designed to do.

That was back then. Today, it’s become more difficult in just the sheer number of platforms that are required. When you get an app certified on Roku, it’s being tested against dozens of different models and versions. When we develop an app, we go through our own process of quality assurance before we even submit to Roku’s app store.

Just by the nature of those things, that’s still the most challenging platform, but it’s also the most worthwhile, we believe, and the publishers should still be leading with that platform.

MCN: Is there any platform that’s making some recent gains in terms of gravity and interest?
TS: We’re seeing a lot of that with Amazon Fire TV. We think that that’s becoming a platform that publishers [are using] to go direct to consumer. [Amazon has] a wonderful development relationship team that supports the development community, so it’s become a lot better for companies to deploy there. From a publisher’s perspective, Amazon is definitely up there now, whereas a year or two ago they were unsure how it was going to play out.

Apple TV is such a powerful platform. I think the concern there is that the channels, unless you’re a big brand, are just getting lost. And that’s a concern across the board. As far as deploying, and deploying on that platform, tvOS has become one where you can do anything you want nowadays. When we’re talking to folks about where you should distribute, I think that’s a big factor.

The smart TVs are also making big strides. Samsung is doubling down with Tizen, [and] the LG webOS platform is still solid, and I think that’s going to start having a bigger impact next year.

MCN: For your company, where do you see the most growth coming from? Is it from virtual MVPDs, SVOD services or even TV everywhere?
TS: Maybe two years ago, anybody who had a VOD library was trying to get into the game. I think nowadays they’re becoming more savvy and more aware of the challenges. That group of folks is starting to subside. Now we’re starting to see a push by the virtual [multichannel video programming distributors] and operators, and they are now targets of ours. That’s not something we’ve traditionally been targeting, but we are going to be targeting that market now and in the future.

And you’re still seeing a lot of the pay TV programmers that are still trying to figure this out [with] TV everywhere. We’ve just deployed Ovation Now, which is the Ovation network’s direct-to-consumer offering for TV everywhere, and they are on our Flicast platform.

MCN: What sorts of features or enhancements are on the roadmap?
TS: Especially because we’re starting to target the MVPDs, I think [electronic program guides] are going to be something we’ll really start to focus on. We have a solid one that’s a base feature that we’ll start rolling out. We’re taking a lot of lessons learned from big brands.

For example, Crackle has a great feature...an always-on feature, which is basically live video playing in the background with the user interface basically hidden, or brought back into focus depending on if you want to navigate content.

It’s a pattern we’re seeing that [consumers] just want to sit down and watch something. Having to browse endlessly, I think, creates a little bit of friction. Now we’re showing video, and if they want to browse, they can browse, but there’s video playing with the always-on feature. That’s also something we’re integrating into Flicast.

Sling TV, Dish Network’s OTT TV service, said it’s the first live/VOD OTT service to become available on select Samsung smart TVs.

Sling TV said its available today on all 2016 Samsung smart TV models via the Samsung Smart Hub, and will reach other Samsung models further down the road.

RELATED: Sling TV Streams to LG's Smart TVs

The launch expands Sling TV’s universe of supported devices, a category that also includes LG connected TVs, Android TV devices (including the Dish-made AirTV Player), Apple TV, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Chromecast, Xbox One, web browsers, and iOS and Android mobile devices, among others.

Support for Samsung TVs also enters play as Sling TV faces stiffening competition from other virtual MVPDs that include YouTube TV, Hulu, PlayStation Vue, fuboTV, and CenturyLink Stream. 

“Integrating Sling TV into our line of Smart TVs helps simplify live TV for our customers,”  Salek Brodsky, vice president of content and services for Samsung Electronics, said in a statement. “As viewers continue to embrace streaming live TV via apps, Sling TV is an obvious win for those who want to truly personalize their entertainment experience for the best value.”

Fresh off a successful IPO, Roku has broadened its streaming player lineup and complemented it with a new, more capable operating system for devices and integrated Roku TVs amid heated competition with rivals such as Amazon, Apple and Google.

RELATED: Roku Rises in Nasdaq Debut

On the device side, Roku said it’s aiming to reach a full spectrum of consumers with low-, mid- and high-end devices that include those for people who are new to streaming or have secondary TVs in the home, to people who require 4K and HDR capabilities alongside a mix of other bells and whistles.

Roku’s new lineup comes ahead of the holiday buying season and soon after rivals Amazon and Apple introduced new models of their own.

RELATED: Amazon Sparks Fire TV With 4K and HDR

Here’s how Roku’s new device lineup stacks up:

-Roku Express and Roku Express+: Representing a more powerful, second generation on Roku’s lower end, the HDMI-connected Roku Express sells for $29.99, while the Roku Express+, offered exclusively at Walmart, supports HDMI and composite A/V ports (for older TVs without HDMI ports), for $39.99. Though the price on those models hasn’t changed from the first-gen versions, the new products pack five times the processing power, according to Lloyd Klarke, Roku’s director of product management.

-Roku Streaming Stick and Roku Streaming Stick+: Both models feature quad-core processors and 802.11 AC dual-band MIMO wireless. The baseline, HD-capable Roku Streaming Stick sells for $49.99 MSRP, while the new Roku Streaming Stick+, which goes for $69.99, features a wireless receiver that’s built into the power cord and supports 4K and HDR video formats and streaming up to 60 frames per second.

In addition to bumping performance, the new steaming sticks will include remotes that support voice input, and the ability to control the TV’s power and volume controls, Klarke said, adding that the new the new sticks essentially replace the Premiere and Premiere+ (introduced last fall) in Roku’s lineup.

Thanks to their compact form-factor, Klarke noted that 59% of Roku streaming stick owners use it in multiple rooms, and 36% have used it out of the home.

-Roku Ultra: The top-end of Roku’s streaming lineup also packs in advanced wireless, 4K and HDR capabilities, plus an Ethernet port and a micro SD slot, for a reduced price of $99.99 (down from the $129 price point introduced last year). The Ultra also includes a remote with a headphone jack for private listening and a remote finder button.

Roku said the new lineup is available for pre-order today from its own site, as well as Walmart, Best Buy, Amazon and other retailers, and is expected to be in stores around Oct. 8.

RELATED: Apple Intros Apple TV 4K

Roku Ready to Roll OS 8

Alongside the new device lineup, Roku also introduced OS 8, a platform that will be rolled out to players but also optimized for integrated Roku TVs.

Among the new features, OS 8 will enable consumers to use their voice to command and control Roku TVs, as well as a more integrated support of video that is streamed or obtained over-the-air with an antenna, explained Shubhada Hebbar, Roku’s VP of product.

Voice controls for Roku TVs can be used with Roku-made remotes with built-in microphones or via the free Roku app for iOS and Android devices.

The new OS’s “Smart Guide” for Roku TVs integrates and displays what’s on via OTA (up to 14 days’ worth of TV programming) and OTT, while also implementing search results from both sources. It also includes a “More Ways to Watch” component that lists out various options for how a show or movie can be accessed on the platform.

While some of the new features of OS 8 center on Roku TVs and are tailored for cord-cutters, the new operating system also tacks on features for users who get a traditional pay TV subscription. 

For example, Roku OS 8 adds a TV Everywhere single sign-on element that will initially support about 30 TVE apps that are authenticated by MVPDs such as Dish Network, Cox Communications and AT&T. Roku initially has teamed with Adobe for the new SSO component, the company confirmed.

The new operating system also features a redesign of the Roku 4K Spotlight Channel.

Roku plans to start rolling out OS 8 on Roku players in early October and to Roku TV models starting in November. The company expects to complete the rollout by year-end.

Business Update 
The bulk of Roku’s revenue currently comes way of sales of streaming players, with the balance from its Platforms business, which includes advertising, subscription revenue sharing, and licensing fees from TV makers that have integrated Roku’s OS (its TV partners include RCA, TCL, Element Electronics, Hitachi America, Haier America, Sharp, and Insignia/Best Buy).

RELATED: RCA Rolls out Roku TV Models 

The majority of hours streamed on Roku’s platform (6.7 billion hours during the first six months of 2017) is of subscription-based content, but the company envisions that it will need to deliver “significantly more ad-supported” content to materially increase the monetization of its platform.

Roku also disclosed that it had 15.1 million active accounts by the end of Q2 2017, up from 10.6 million in the year-ago quarter.

The rapid, technology-fueled evolution of the TV business has created opportunities and challenges for advertisers and programmers. None of those has more upside than tapping into the “smart” part of the smart TV.

It’ has taken a few years for the market to appreciate what it means to have a connected TV. The device that dominated the last 70 years of entertainment and advertising was suddenly blessed with new capabilities. The advent of smart TVs was potentially disruptive, and even threatening, to certain entrenched players, such as set-top box makers with a vested interest in dumb TVs; traditional service providers, who distributed the boxes as a revenue source; and the measurement industrial complex that profits from small panels and iffy set-top-box data.

These parties have resisted — and at times have actively hindered — the development of a vibrant smart TV ecosystem. That is, until the changing TV landscape starting showing the networks, agencies and programmers just how transformative these new data streams can be.

Data Drives Pace of Innovation
Now, internet-connected TVs (and streaming devices) are providing a more intuitive content experience and are helping audience-based buying and addressable advertising reach scale. All of those innovations depend on one thing: data. And unlike data from set-top boxes, panels or other sources, smart TVs measure all types of viewing, and as it happens — over-the-air, through a set-top box or via an over-the-top service. Smart TV data brings transparency to a clouded TV data market.

Related > Consumers Uncomfortable With Smart TV Data Collection: Survey

Earlier this year, in a case involving Vizio, the Federal Trade Commission for the first time clarified the required fair information practices for capturing and using information about the content playing on TVs.

As these and other data-market participants continue to digest and apply these new rules of the road, Vizio has led the industry in educating consumers about the collection and use of viewing history. We firmly believe that collecting and using this data — in nonidentified ways — means better, more relevant experiences on all of their entertainment devices for consumers.

Here are the main pillars of the new standards set by the FTC for all TV makers:
1. Smart TV makers must prominently disclose their viewing data collection, use and sharing practices — including how the data is augmented, such as with demographic or cross-device information or inferences, the types of companies to whom it is disclosed and the purposes of the disclosure (i.e., analytics, audience measurement and ad targeting).

2. The notification must be unavoidable and separate from any terms of service or privacy policy.

3. Smart TV makers must get express permission from TV owners before collecting, using or sharing television-viewing information.

Only if the entire industry comes into better compliance with these new (government-mandated) standards for collecting and using viewing history will the promise of smart TVs to deliver better entertainment and a more precise and efficient programming and advertising marketplace be fulfilled.

Unfortunately, not all companies appear to us to be equally committed to meeting the new legal standards, even though those standards are now clear. Our testing indicates that many companies are still hiding behind opaque, muddying disclosures, rather than leveling with consumers in plain, easy-to-follow disclosures as the FTC has required.

The FTC’s requirements for prominent notice of actual practices and explicit consent have been plainly stated for many months now. Any past legal uncertainty has long been cleared up. There is no excuse in today’s market for not being compliant in these basic respects.

If a TV maker can’t execute a firmware update or other mechanism to meet its clear obligations, then it’s hard to see why the right answer is to persist with tracking practices the FTC has deemed unfair.

Metrics Cleanup Will Take Time
Because compliance is not 100% across the industry and many actors are using back-door tactics to gain consumer consent (such as TV ad tech posing as something else), cleaning up the market is not a fast or easy endeavor. Many companies, brands and agencies are therefore seemingly reliant on squishy metrics. Agencies buy and resell these metrics on a campaign basis and perhaps don’t realize the potential breaches of privacy, the general lack of standards or the associated risks.

This doesn’t have to be the case. Those companies have to change their models to be more transparent, from the opt-in until the data is delivered. At Inscape, we can’t hide or obscure anything; when our partners receive their data, a daily device count is one of the key metrics. But we know that is not the case for everyone.

There is simply no easy third-party way to track which clients are or are not detecting content. And therein lies the challenge. It’s like counting impressions based on the number of people who have the internet instead of those that actually saw the ad on a screen.

As an industry, we can and must do better.

When flawed data — information poorly gathered and misrepresented — is peddled, the resulting smoke and mirrors harms media buyers and could lead to more regulatory sanctions and complaints from wary viewers and brands. We’re all fortunate to have businesses based on television, a wonderfully sophisticated device whose potential is just beginning to be tapped, 80 years after it first entered the living room. The industry needs to work together to ensure that the smart TV environment remains secure and to build a higher-functioning source of consistent and actionable viewership data.

Jodie McAfee is senior vice president of sales and marketing atInscape.tv.

LG said its webOS-powered 2017 OLED Super UHD smart TV models have stitched in support for Sling TV, Dish Network’s OTT TV service.

Those 2017 models are powered by webOS 3.5, the latest version of LG’s smart TV platform.

LG made Sling TV available on its 2016 smart TV models earlier this year. Sling TV also supports Apple TV (4th generation), Amazon Fire TV, Android TV and Amazon Fire TV devices, the Chromecast streaming adapter, AirTV Player, Channel Master DVRs, the Xbox One, Web browsers, and iOS and Android mobile devices.

RELATED: LG Buys HP's WebOS for Smart TVs

LG also announced that its Channel Plus app has surpassed 100 OTT-delivered channels. That lineup includes Bloomberg Politics, Funny or Die, Baeble Music, PBS Digital Studios, Family Feud, the People/Entertainment Weekly Network, Cheddar and Tastemade, among others.

Channels Plus, a free, ad-supported service powered by Xumo, is offered on 2016 and 2017 LG models running webOS 3.0 and 3.5. In addition to SVOD streaming, Channels Plus also allows users to integrate and present over-the-air broadcast channels.

RELATED: LG Tunes In 'Channels Plus'

Consumers aren’t comfortable with their data being collected by smart TVs, according to a survey conducted by Videa, Cox Media’s automated ad platform.

The survey found that 48% of consumers said they were somewhat, mostly or completely uncomfortable with advertisers collecting smart TV data.

Related: Vizio Settles Smart TV Data Collection Complaint

Only 39% said they are somewhat, mostly or completely comfortable with their data being collected by advertisers. The answer most given, at 21% of respondents, was that they were completely uncomfortable with the data collection.

Related: When Smart TVs Get Too Personal, What's the MSO Role?

The study also asked about cord-cutting. Consumers surveyed said they would miss live programming or specific programs if they gave up their pay TV subscriptions. They also said they would miss news channels, weather, sports, channel-surfing and the variety they now get.

In these divisive times, the survey also found that the majority (61%) of respondents said they had some or a lot of trust in the information they get from local news organizations.

A survey last year bythe Pew Research Center found that 22% of the adults it surveyed had a lot of trust in local news, and that another 60% had some trust, for a total of 82%. That compared to 18% who had a lot of trust in national news organizations and 59% who had some trust. Social media garnered only 4% of respondents who said they had a lot of trust, and 30% had some trust.

Related: Pew: Older Demos Drive Mobile News Growth

Videa’s survey found that 59% of the respondents said they get their local news from TV, compared with 38% via social media, 36% from print and 36% from local radio.

Among viewers who said they had a clear preference, 62% said they trusted local news over national news, while 38% said they trusted national news more.

Of those trusting local news, 31% said they trust it because there is less bias or no political agenda, the survey found.

Videa's survey was conducted online with 1,145 adults responding between March 21 and March 22. The figures have been weighted to make they representative of all U.S. adults.

TCL announced pricing and expected availability of a batch of Roku-powered TVs that support 4K and High Dynamic Range and were introduced in January at CES.

The new group of C-series and P-series models from TCL will feature Dolby Vision HDR and access to Roku’s menu of 5,000-plus online channels/apps.

TCL’s C-series start at under $700: 55” (55C807, $699); 65” (65C807, $1099); and 75” (75C807, $1999).

Its P-series will be offered in 50” (50P607), 55” (55P607), and 65” (65P607) screen sizes. TCL is offering the 55” model available for an introductory price of $599 when pre-ordered via Amazon.com starting May 26.

Roku also has TV integration deals with RCA, Element Electronics, Hitachi America, Haier America, Sharp, Insignia (Best Buy’s in-house brand), and Hisense. Haier is shifting to a platform powered by Google’s “Chromecast built-in” platform, but Roku has pledged to continue supporting and providing software updates to Haier smart TVs that use Roku’s OS.

RELATED: Roku, RCA Strike Smart TV Deal

Roku is broadening its push into the smart TV market after inking a licensing deal with RCA.

The deal, in conjunction with Display-Vu Group, an affiliate of Curtis International, will see RCA start to offer Roku-powered HDTV models sometime this summer in the U.S. and Canada.

Outfitted with Roku’s operating system, those TVs will provide access to Roku’s array of more than 5,000 streaming “channels,” and a library of about 450,000 movies and TV shows, they said. RCA TVs are manufactured and distributed in the U.S. and Canada by Display-Vu Corp.

The deal also marks a shift of allegiance for RCA, which has also been working with Android TV.

RELATED: Roku Rolls New OS

RCA, a brand now owned by Technicolor, joins a growing roster or Roku TV partners. Others TV makers with Roku licensing deals include Element Electronics, Hitachi America, Haier America, Sharp, Insignia (Best Buy’s in-house brand), and Hisense. Of that group, Haier is pivoting to a platform powered by Google’s “Chromecast built-in” platform, but Roku has pledged to continue supporting and providing software updates to Haier smart TVs that use Roku’s OS.

RELATED: CES 2017: Roku Adds Another TV Partner

Citing shipment data from IHS, Roku has previously held that Roku TVs accounted for 13% of all U.S. smart TV sales, or one out of eight smart TV purchases, citing new TV shipment data from IHS.

“RCA is an iconic brand with deep roots in the living room. Consumers love the brand and as we combine that with today’s modern streaming approach, RCA Roku TVs are sure to be a favorite this year,” Chas Smith GM of Roku TV and players, said in a statement.

Roku said recently it had 14 million “active accounts” as of March 31, 2017. The privately held companypulled in nearly $400 million in revenues for 2016, with $100 million coming from its media and licensing division.

Xumo, a company that has developed a free, ad-supported OTT video aggregation service, said it has integrated Cheddar’s live feed into its native platform for smart TVs made by companies such as LG Electronics, Vizio, Panasonic and Hisense.

Xumo, which has also developed apps for mobile devices, said Cheddar is the first channel on its platform to feature live daily shows, noting that Cheddar, a financial-focused network tailored for younger audiences.  Live programming from Cheddar featured on Xumo includes Opening Bell (9 a.m. ET); and Between Bells (Noon ET).

RELATED: Xumo Taps ‘Virtual Input’ to Stream to Hisense and Sharp TVs

Xumo currently features more than 70 digital channels. Parnters include Cracked (acquired in April 2016 by E.W. Scripps Company), Funny Or Die, Time Inc., Condé Nast Entertainment, Bloomberg, Reuters, The Wall Street Journal, BuzzFeed, PopSugar, Mitú Network, Machinima, TYT Network, Reuters, Field & Stream, PBS Digital Studios, Network A, Fandor, Outside Television Shorts, Bonnier, Saveur, and Cycle  World, among others. 

For Cheddar, the Xumo deal broadens its platform reach, as it’s also available on iOS and Android mobile devices, Android TV devices, Apple TV boxes, Roku players, along with distribution on OTT services and platforms such as Sling TV, Vimeo and Pluto TV. 

Roku said that it will continue to support and provide software updates to Haier connected TVs that integrate its streaming platform amid a report that Haier is moving in another direction, with Google.  

Twice reported that Haier is dropping Roku’s platform to instead move forward with one that builds in Google’s Google Cast technology (recently rebranded as “Chromecast built-in”), which is used in the Chromecast streaming adapter, in boxes for Google Fiber’s TV service, as well as from other TV makers, including Vizio, Sharp, Sony, Toshiba, and Philips.

RELATED: Vizio’s 4K-Capable ‘P-Series’ TVs Add Google Cast

According to Twice, Haier plans to launch a line of Chromecast-based (with screen sizes ranging from 43 inches to 75 inches) in Q2.  “With Google, we can better leverage Haier’s global footprint and develop platforms which we can use in different countries,” James Liess, Haier America’s director of marketing and communications, said, according to Twice.

Roku issued this statement regarding Haier’s decision:

“The market continues to evolve and so do company’s priorities. Haier is focused on its international footprint whereas we are focused on North America right now so they chose to use another solution. Haier Roku TVs will continue to be available in the near-term. We will continue to support Haier Roku TVs and they will continue to get SW updates for the foreseeable future.”

Haier started to sell Roku-powered TVs in 2015.

Despite the loss of Haier, Roku said its TV integration business remains strong. Last week, it announced Element Electronics as a Roku TV partner, and said Roku TVs now account for 13% of all U.S. smart TV sales.

Roku’s other TV partners include Hitachi America, Sharp, Insignia (Best Buy’s in-house brand), and Hisense. 

Get complete coverage of CES 2017

Presenting some fresh competition to Google’s Android TV and Roku in the smart TV sector, Seiki, Westinghouse Electronics and Element Electronics – TV brands from China’s Tongfang Global -- will use CES 2017 to unveil the first 4K Ultra ... have announced a line of 4K TVs that will bake in Amazon’s Fire TV platform.

Those new Amazon Fire TV edition models will also support an integrated guide, voice remotes powered by Amazon Alexa and present a platform that, they said, will offer access to more than 7,000 channels, apps and Alexa “skills.”

RELATED: Roku Adds Another TV Parnter 

Seiki, Westinghouse and Element are rolling out Fire TV-based 4K TVs with screen sizes of 43 inches, 50 inches, 55 inches and 65 inches, 3 gigabytes of memory and 16 GB of internal storage, and integrated Bluetooth, WiFi and Ethernet connectivity.

Pricing on those models haven’t been announced yet, but the trio expects to start selling Fire TV Edition models later this year at Amazon.com and at select national retailers later this year.

Seiki and Westinghouse will demo new models at tonight’s CES 2017 Unveiled event.

Roku’s integrated TV partners include Element Electronics, TCL, Hitachi America, Haier America, Sharp, Insignia (Best Buy’s in-house brand), and Hisense. Sharp and Sony make TVs that utilize Google’s Android TV OS.

"Teaming up with brands including Seiki, Westinghouse and Element on a new range of smart TVs allows Amazon to deliver an experience that's familiar and easy to use," Marc Whitten, vice president, Amazon Fire TV, said in a statement. "Fire TV Edition offers access to a great selection of streaming and over-the-air TV and movies, Alexa for easy voice search and content control, and the many other features and experiences customers have come to expect from the best-selling line of Amazon Fire TV products."

Whether and how the Federal Trade Commission moves ahead with its current examination of smart television sets -- especially their role in the ongoing privacy brouhaha -- depends on a number of factors, including industry and public response to the current call for comments, which runs through Friday, Jan. 6.

Related Video > The FTC's Fall Technology Series: Smart TVs, Part 1

The new administration's impetus to develop privacy regulations is questionable, and the controversy over the FCC's recent broadband privacy rules augment the uncertainty about federal examination of TV sets' ability to monitor viewers.

"Smart TVs are testing the privacy expectations that consumers developed in the era of traditional television," Jessica Rich, director of the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection, said in her opening remarks at an FTC Smart TV policy workshop on Dec. 7. She cited -- as did many subsequent speakers -- "the fundamentally different relationship" that viewers have with TV sets and computers, insisting that "it matters whether consumers think of their smart TVs as a computer or a television ... and whether they recognize that today it may be both."

"We've been watching this industry since its infancy," Rich continued, noting that privacy policies -- such as those developed during the FTC's review of TiVo's viewer data collection activities 15 years ago -should be update. She observed that the 1984 Cable Privacy Act and the 1988 Video Privacy Protection Act addressed the "video providers of the day" but that streaming technology and other delivery approaches -- including features of Comcast's Xfinity system -- are encouraging the FTC to examine the "benefits and risks of smart TV" and determine a need for legislative action.

Rich acknowledged the value to advertisers of smart TVs' ability to monitor viewing patterns. She said that the FTC recognized "the fine-grained audience measurement which can help niche video programmers get ad dollars that may not have registered with more blunt video tools."

The FTC's December workshop attracted several hundred attendees, including electronics makers, privacy advocates and digital marketing executives; it was the third session of the agency's "Fall Technology Series," which also looked at ransomware and drones.

Cable industry executives were not involved. The NCTA is "not participating in the proceeding; just observing it," an NCTA spokesman told Multichannel News.

The workshop's panel on "Consumer Understanding and the Regulatory Framework" generated a string of concerns about the relationship between viewers and their TV sets, including persistent findings  audiences don't know they are being tracked.

"Consumers don't understand the complex interplay and relations that come into play with smart TVs," said Claire Gartland, consumer protection counsel and director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. She voiced concern that data "disclose personal lifestyle factors" that could be used, for example, by insurers to determine medical eligibility.

Dallas Harris, a policy fellow at Public Knowledge, the advocacy group, characterized the process as "learned helplessness," where consumers "feel concerned about losing control of their own information." Harris said the "FTC and FCC will have to work together" since neither has complete jurisdiction over the Cable Privacy Act.

She cited the connections between Comcast and third parties over TV and online data collection.

"There's got to be a better way to explain we're not using your PII [Personally Identifiable Information] but we still know who you are," Harris said.

Emmett O'Keefe, senior VP of advocacy at the Data and Marketing Association (formerly the Direct Marketing Association) warned attendees "not to jump to conclusions about the need for smart TV privacy regulations," adding, "These are services we've used for years and are just migrating to new devices as technology evolves."

O'Keefe, a former Cablevision Systems and Amazon lobbyist, called smart TVs a "natural extension of online services."

Uncertain Outlook

Kevin Moriarty, an attorney in the FTC's Division of Privacy and Identity Protection and an organizer of the Smart TV Workshop, told Multichannel News that the event -- with about a dozen speakers -- generated "a lot of interesting things, but that's not a test for whether we'll write a report."

He said the FTC will "continue to look at data-related issues." The agency reports only about half the time after such public events, he explained.

Despite the invitation for public and industry comments about the FTC Smart TV examination, as of Dec. 27 the docket contained only two submissions -- both from individuals and both submitted before the December workshop.

During one panel, Maria Rerecich, director of the Electronics Testing Team at Consumer Reports, said her group is working on new research standards for use with smart TVs and other forms of electronic monitoring. She expects the standards will be introduced in early 2017.

The FTC will pick up some of the smart TV privacy issues at its second annual "PrivacyCon" workshop on Jan. 12 in Washington. Several Smart TV Workshop  participants cited the growing relationship between TV/privacy factors and the broader examination of digital privacy and big data usage across multiple platforms. The FTC's initial PrivacyCon, this year, drew about 300 attendees and 1,500 webcast "virtual attendees."

In an interview after the December FTC workshop, Tim Hanlon, a long-time digital ad executive, cited the importance of Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) in the development of smart TV policies. Hanlon, who is now CEO of the Vertere Group, a Chicago boutique investment advisory and strategic consulting firm that works with electronics and media companies, attended the workshop on behalf of clients.

He later told Multichannel News that ACR's ability to recognize "content that hits the glass" is at the core of these examinations. The technology can keep track of what's on the screen "no matter the source" (cable, over-the-top, streaming or broadcast).

"Some people think that's the ultimate," Hanlon summarized. "ACR data is hugely helpful  to media, notwithstanding privacy. ...  It's a way to understand consumer behavior,  a realistic way to understand the myriad of media consumption habits today. At the very least it supplements what Nielsen tells us today."

As evidence of the importance, Hanlon cited recent deals, such as Nielsen's acquisition of Gracenote, a  provider of media and entertainment metadata, including ACR capabilities.

Showtime Networks has expanded its streaming reach by offering its standalone OTT subscription service as well as its authenticated TV Everywhere offering, Showtime Anytime, on select 2015 and all 2016 connected TV models from Samsung.

Via those smart TVs, consumers can subscribe to the standalone offering, which sells for $10.99 per month, and access the premium programmer’s TVE offering, which support Showtime’s East and West coast live feeds, as well as a VOD library that features series such as Homeland, Billions, Ray Donovan, The Affair, Shameless and upcoming new original series, Twin Peaks.

RELATED: Showtime to Offer Subs Original ‘Twin Peaks’ Dec. 26

Showtime Anytime is also supported on Web browsers, iOS and Android mobile devices, Google’s Chromecast streaming adapter, Roku players, Android TV devices, Amazon Fire TV devices, the Xbox 360 and Xbox One and Apple TV.

Subscribers to the Showtime standalone service can also authenticate the service through  Showtime Anytime. Showtime also distributes its standalone service through partners such as Amazon, Hulu and Sony PlayStation Vue.

RELATED:  Amazon Sells Showtime, Starz Add-On  Subscriptions

LG Electronics USA is nearing the launch of  Channel Plus, a streaming service powered by Xumo that offers a menu of live and on-demand content on the TV-maker’s 2016 lineup of webOS-based smart televisions.

Channel Plus, coming to LG TVs with webOS 3.0, will feature free, ad-supported digital content from partners such as Time, PBS Digital Studios, Wired, Saveur, Cooking Light, GQ and Sports Illustrated, along with channels from BuzzFeed, Mashable, Reuters, FailArmy and Funny or Die. LG said High-quality international channels are also available free of charge for users with international tastes.

Channel Plus, available starting this month with a software update on 2016 LG smart TVs, will offer nearly 50 channels at launch, including some international channels. A channel from the new PeopleEntertainment Network from Time Inc. is slated to launch later this year.

LG said “channels” on the new OTT service look like traditional TV channels and surf them without having to launch them like a separate app.

“By delivering premium Internet content seamlessly with broadcast channels together in the same channel lineup, LG aims to make it easier than ever for consumers to find and enjoy the content they want to watch in one centralized place – whether it’s streaming or broadcast,” David VanderWaal, VP of marketing at LG Electronics, said in statement.

Xumo, an aggregator of ad-based OTT fare, also has integrations with Vizio, Panasonic and Funai Electric, which makes Sanyo-, Magnavox- and Philips-branded TVs in North America. It recently launched a mobile app for iOS, with a version for Android on deck.

The FCC’s proposal to open cable set-top boxes to competition has thrust them into the spotlight as relates to the cost they place upon consumers and the innovation that competition from non-MVPD providers could bring.

But they are also rising in importance because of another discussion that is of perhaps greater relevance to the industry. That is the role that STBs play not as content portals, but as providers of return-path data (RPD).

From their inception, set-tops have had the potential to supply second-by-second viewing data captured passively – providing a level of granular insight into viewing behavior that was not before possible. And while not all MVPDs have made their data available, the availability of this data set from those that did has transformed audience measurement and has begun to lay the framework for audience-based buying, improved ad ROI measurement, addressable advertising services and, ultimately, scalable cross-platform measurement.

More recently, the emergence of smart TVs provided an alternative to set-tops as a source of second-by-second viewing, with some significant differences.

Unlike STBs, smart TVs can tell when a television set is on or off. STBs know only when the box itself has been turned off, not the TV. Therefore the potential exists to record content as being viewed when a set has been turned off but the STB remains on. To counter this, STB data providers use cap and edit rules that enable them to determine for specific types of content after what period of uninterrupted “viewing” the data should be cut off.

Smart TVs can also capture all television usage, including SVOD and digital games, while STBs can only measure linear television or what is passing through the box.

Smart TVs can also capture over-the-air (OTA) households, which obviously STBs cannot. While it may be a small set of viewers who have broadband Internet access but still view TV OTA, it offers a view into these households.

But while Smart TVs indeed have certain advantages for audience measurement as compared to STBs, they have shortcomings as well.

First and foremost, no Smart TV manufacturer is fully representative of the entire U.S., so there is no national footprint. And while not all MVPDs provide their STB data and therefore are not fully representative of the U.S. either, there is a large enough supply of data available from those providing data to cover perhaps 40% to 50% of the country.

STBs provide another distinct advantage in that they usually are connected to most, if not all, the television sets in a household, while at this point there is typically only one smart TV per household that has been connected to the Internet. Therefore, full household viewing behavior in these households may go uncaptured.

These comparisons and contrasts have inevitably led to the debate over which data set is of greater value to broadcasters and advertisers – RPD from STBs or from smart TVs?

But the reality is that the differences between the two types of data clearly demonstrate that their greater value lies in being complementary data sets, rather than competitive, and efforts should be made to determine how we can best combine them for a much more comprehensive and valuable approach to audience measurement.

The challenge in doing so is not insignificant and also not without concerns. The primary among these is how do we combine these data sets and protect viewer data privacy?

What would need to be done is to find some way to aggregate all viewers who have explicitly opted in to provide data, and work to have their data anonymized so that there was no way in which a user could get back to any individual viewer’s PPI. 

As has been demonstrated before with integrated data sets, a third-party provider for aggregating the data in this manner would in all probability be the best way to go.

The need for second-by-second viewing data across the spectrum of television content and collected on a scaled nationally representative basis is critical to the advancement of vital industry initiatives ranging from audience based buying to greater understanding of ROI and development of effective cross-platform measurement of both content and ads.

Set-tops and smart TVs each provide important data sets for the advancement of these objectives, but clearly they can be more effective in doing so collectively than competitively.

CIMM, under its mission of advancing cross-platform measurement, is launching an initiative to identify potential partners to combine smart TV and STB data in a manner that would protect viewer privacy while complementing the strengths and weaknesses of both methods.

We believe that through this initiative, data from MVPDs' set-tops and smart TVs, as well as data from what other STBs might come along from new providers, will work in concert together, providing a much more complete picture of national television viewing and fulfilling the promise of advanced audience measurement.

Jane Clarke is CEO and managing director of the Coalition for Innovative Media Measurement (CIMM).

Add Hitachi America Ltd. to the growing list of TV makers that will offer smart TVs that are powered by Roku’s app and streaming platform.

Hitachi has joined its Roku TV licensing program, and plans to roll out its first Roku-powered 4K and HD TVs this fall. Pricing hasn’t been announced, but Hitachi, they said, will offer Roku TV models in a “variety of screen sizes.”

The deal marks an expansion of Roku’s smart TV strategy. Other partners include TCL, which introduced six 4K-capable Roku TV models in March, Haier America, Sharp, Insignia (Best Buy’s in-house brand), and Hisense. Under a temporary partnership, LG Electronics sold two "entry level" Roku TV HDTV models during at Best Buy during the 2015 holiday season.

Last year was the first full year for the Roku TV licensing program. Roku said more than 40 TV models now support its platform in the U.S., claiming that sales of those products account for 8% of the U.S. smart TV market. This year, it expects more than 60 models to ship in the U.S., with screen sizes ranging from 24 inches to 65 inches.

Roku, whose platform supports more than 3,000 apps and streaming channels, recently crossed 10 million active monthly users. 

Xumo, an aggregator of ad-based OTT video, has made good on its word to expand beyond the smart TV with its first app for mobile devices.

Xumo entered the mobile fold this week with an app for iOS, with a version for Android to bow “in a few months.”

Xumo launched its first mobile app in concert with this week’s VidCon event in Anaheim.

Xumo’s first focus was native apps for smart TVs, touting a reach of nearly 20 million devices in the U.S. thanks to integrations with LG, Vizio, Panasonic and Funai Electric, which makes Sanyo-, Magnavox- and Philips-branded TVs in North America.

“In an era where cable bills have become comically huge, we’re pleased to offer free premium content via mobile in addition to TV,” Colin Petrie-Norris, CEO of Xumo, said in a statement. “We live in an on-the-go culture so delivering content to the viewer wherever they are and whenever they want it aligns perfectly with our mission.”

Xumo also announced the addition of five new comedy-focused “channels” for its platform– Cracked (acquired in April by E.W. Scripps Company), Funny Or Die, Comedy Dynamics, JASH, and Just for Laughs.

Other announced content partners for Xumo’s platform include Time Inc., Condé Nast Entertainment, Bloomberg, Reuters, The Wall Street Journal, BuzzFeed, PopSugar, Mitú Network, Machinima, TYT Network, Reuters, Field & Stream, PBS Digital Studios , Network A, Fandor, Outside Television Shorts, Bonnier, Saveur, and Cycle  World.

Xumo said it is offering the same slate of content on its mobile and smart TV apps.

Xumo, a startup that has built an ad-supported OTT video service initially focused on smart TV platforms, said its reach is approaching 60% of the U.S. following the launch of integrations on connected TVs from Magnavox, Philips, and Sanyo – brands made and sold by Funai Electric.

Xumo, which focuses on native integrations with those platforms, also has similar deals with LG Electronics, Panasonic and Vizio.

At this weeks’ NewFronts in New York, Xumo noted that Channel Plus will be natively integrated with LG’s line of 2016 smart TVs (including OLED and Super UHD models) running its webOS 3.0 platform.  Channel Plus is set for a summer 2016 debut.

Xumo claimed that the deals in place cover 60% of smart TVs shipped in the U.S.

Xumo’s said its feeding those platforms with  a lineup of nearly 80 free premium Internet channels. Announced content partners include Fail Army, Time Inc., Condé Nast Entertainment, Bloomberg, Reuters, The Wall Street Journal, BuzzFeed, PopSugar, Mitú Network, Machinima, TYT Network, Reuters, Field & Stream, PBS Digital Studios, Mashable, Network A, Fandor, Outside Television Shorts, Bonnier, Saveur, Cycle  World, and The Onion.

Outside Television is Xumo's first deal with a cable network, though focused on short-form content, while Fandor is Xumo's initial foray into long-form. 

Xumo, which also supports iOS and Android smartphones, is also looking to expand onto other TV-connected streaming platforms. 

Get complete coverage of the FCC's set-top proposal.

FCC chairman Tom Wheeler says that Comcast's announcement that it was putting set-top box functionality into Samsung Smart TVs and would not charge a monthly fee made the FCC's set-top case for it. He said he was encouraged by the “technological and business solution" the announcement represents, and said it was a "model" and in "accord" with what the FCC "has been  talking about."

But he still said the set-top proposal needed to get done to make sure that kind of model was available across the board. "Let's take how that is happening, put that in the rule, and make it available for everybody."

"I think that what Comcast just did is proving our point that you can take a third-party device, put set-top box functionality into it, and protect copyright and the economic ecosystem."

Cable operators have argued that Wheeler's proposal to make set-top content and data available to third parties threatens content protections, contracts, and ad integrity, and would require new devices and network rebuilds.

Wheeler said it would not mean rebuilding the network or "all the other horrible things" the industry has cited.

he said the essence of the proposal was that content could be safely moved to third-party devices.

Asked if Comcast's move did not signal the market was already moving in that direction without the FCC, Wheeler answered that this was about one device and one cable company and that, "what Comcast giveth, Comcast can taketh away."

He suggested that Comcast had proven the concept that box functionality into third-party devices, then "let's make sure that supplies to all cable operators. Let's make sure that applies to all TV's. Let's make sure there is an opportunity for someone who can't afford a new TV but would like to quit paying the monthly fees and would rather buy a set-top box."

But as to Comcast's move somehow obviating the need for the set-top reg, he was not going there.

Wheeler said in anticipation of getting the question, he had Googled "Comcast Samsung" and the first thing that came up was: "We have decided to discontinue support of the Xfinity TV on Samsung's Smart TV app as of Aug. 3, 2015. So, that which Comcast, Comcast can taketh away," he said. He also pointed out that in 2010 NCTA came to the FCC in another proceeding with something similar to what he was proposing, "and 99% of consumers still don't have choice."

He said it was essential that the third party option be available to everyone regardless of who their cable operator is, regardless of the kind of TV, and "for all time, not until a unilateral decision is made to pull the plug."

Wheeler said his proposal "has gotta be done. And that's the road we are headed down."

"We are pleased that the Chairman has recognized Comcast’s announcement of the open-standard Xfinity TV Partner Program last week as a 'good win' and 'important thing,'" Comcast said in a statement. "This open source apps-based program is available to any interested third-party device manufacturer, including the dozens of companies that have already reached out to us since the announcement, further demonstrating the success of the marketplace apps-based approach that is occurring without heavy-handed government regulation. 

"While the Chairman complimented Comcast’s announcement, he questioned how to make that commitment applicable to other cable companies, but in our comments in the FCC’s proceeding, Comcast put forward principles to ensure the continued acceleration of apps in the marketplace.  

"Most importantly, the Chairman suggests that our app shows why his proposal can work, but the opposite is true.  The Chairman’s proposal favors a government-imposed set-top box mandate that goes well beyond expanding equipment options for consumers to instead taking apart existing video services to create new services.  That approach not only exceeds the FCC’s rulemaking authority, but also -- in stark contrast to the apps approach -- it creates numerous harms  -- increasing consumer costs, weakening content security, eroding privacy and other consumer protections, and undermining intellectual property rights and content licensing agreements.  In fact, our announcement proves the viability of a market-driven apps-based approach, which avoids the major issues with the hardware-based approach of the Commission’s Notice."

The Future of TV Coalition said it was glad Wheeler had notice that the marketplace is "already producing real technology solutions enabling a growing number of consumers to watch pay TV programming without a set-top box."

But it said those "market-driven, app-based solutions" were a far cry from the "sweeping, Google-backed mandate [Wheeler] has proposed," adding: "The Chairman’s mandate strips content creators of the tools they use to enforce licensing agreements and protect copyrights, while increasing consumer costs and weakening consumer privacy protections.  This is why a growing chorus of voices from diverse advocacy organizations, the creative community, and lawmakers in Congress are speaking out against Chairman Wheeler’s unnecessary and harmful mandate.”