The deal, announced Monday (June 15), will make Fox the third-largest player in the television world in terms of viewership share. The companies say they plan to operate Roku “as an open, partner-friendly platform” committed to “the continued ubiquitous distribution of FOX content.”
Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch noted in a news release that the deal follows the company’s pivot to focus on news and live sports in 2019 and its acquisition of the Tubi streaming service in 2020.
“Today, we take the next step: bringing together the most valuable live content portfolio in video consumption with the preeminent streaming platform through which America watches it,” Murdoch said.
“This combination will transform the scope of our company into high-growth verticals and yield a step change in our overall growth profile.”
According to a CNBC report on the deal, Murdoch said in a call with investors Monday that the companies want to keep Tubi and The Roku Channel separate once the deal closes.
He called them “incredibly complementary services” with roughly a third of overlap between their audiences. CNBC noted that most Tubi viewers come for on-demand content, in contrast to the free channels created in the mold of the traditional pay TV bundle.
The deal is subject to regulatory approval, and comes just as the U.S. government has signed off on an even larger media consolidation: Paramount Skydance’s planned purchase of Warner Bros. Discovery, cleared last week by the Justice Department.
“If completed, the $110 billion transaction would reshape the global entertainment landscape, creating a media powerhouse with an unmatched portfolio of film and television properties at a time when traditional studios are racing to adapt to the economics of the streaming era,” Competition Policy International, a PYMNTS company, wrote recently.
However, that report added, the deal still faces some regulatory hurdles. Authorities in Europe and the U.K. are examining the merger, while states including California and New York have been preparing legal action to block the deal, arguing that greater consolidation in the media sector could lessen opportunities for creative workers and hinder competition.
Meanwhile, recent research from PYMNTS Intelligence shows that while consumers are cutting back on spending, streaming services are likely to survive, as 73% of consumers did not flag entertainment as a challenge.
Figures like that, PYMNTS wrote earlier this month, challenge the idea that people under financial pressure just cut back on everything that isn’t a necessity.
