INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Fox Corp., the broadcast news and entertainment company holding what remains of the Murdoch Family television and cable sports and media
assets after the sale of 21st Century Fox to Disney, has agreed to acquire the streaming service Tubi TV for $440 million.
Tubi, once of a
now-dwindling number of free ad-supported streaming services, will bring a new digitally native consumer offering to Fox with
younger-skewing audience that consumes roughly 160 million hours of entertainment on the platform, according to a statement.
Available on
over 25 digital platforms in the United States and featuring 20,000 titles and 56,000 hours of film and television from 250 content
partners — including major studios — will now be able to pull from Fox stable of news and sports programming in addition to all that
licensed television and film.
Fox said that it will integrate its digital advertising, direct-to-consumer features, and personalization
technology into Tubi advertising platform
Fox watchers can now expect to see a deluge of Tubi ads flood their appointment watching of Neil Cavuto and Fox and Friends.
Tubi will
immediately expand our direct-to-consumer audience and capabilities and will provide our advertising partners with more opportunities to
reach audiences at scale,& said Fox Corp
chief executive, Lachlan Murdoch in a statement
&Importantly, coupled with the combined power of Fox existing networks, Tubi provides a substantial base from which we will drive long-term
growth in the direct-to-consumer area.
Tubi chief executive, Farhad Massoudi, will continue to lead Tubi efforts and said that Fox
relationships with advertisers and distributors would be a big boost to the company growth.
Fox is paying for the Tubi acquisition with
money earned from its sale of the 5 percent stake it held in Roku — another ad-supported streamer
The company said it was basically exchanging a passive minority investment in Roku for full ownership and control of a leadership position
in the free ad-supported streaming market.
It&ll be interesting to see how Fox adjusts programming on the service which primarily comes from
Warner Bros., Paramount, Lionsgate and NBCUniversal .
With the acquisition, Fox becomes the second big old-line network to buy into the
ad-supported streaming business
In January, Viacom bought the streaming service PlutoTV for $340 million.
Viacom buys the free video streaming service Pluto.tv for $340
million
Fox was advised by Allen - Co
on the deal, while Qatalyst Partners served as Tubi sole financial adviser.
