Roku: Anthony Wood
How I Built This with Guy Raz
How Roku Makes Money
Roku makes money through various sources: selling hardware devices like streaming sticks, licensing software to television manufacturers, revenue sharing agreements with content providers, and selling video ads. While Roku does not have a monthly subscription like cable operators, they have a billing platform and receive a piece of subscription revenue when they sign up subscribers. Roku also gets ad inventory shares from content providers who have ads in their streaming services. Selling video ads is actually their biggest business. Roku tapped into the opportunity of advertising in streaming as the TV advertising industry is shifting towards streaming. They created the Roku channel, offering free ad-supported movies and TV shows, which generates a lot of ad inventory and contributes to their ad business. Initially, Roku started by licensing content, but now they produce their own originals for the Roku channel.
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