An ad company’s foray into TV operating systems (OSes) illustrates a significant shift for TV hardware toward products that are increasingly focused on ad sales and tracking.
With more people using web-based streaming for TV, smart TV OSes have become the most lucrative part of the TV business. OS owners accumulate valuable data on how people use their smart TVs and streaming sticks, which is helpful for OS operators as well as third parties, like companies paying for ads distributed via TV OSes. Meanwhile, the smart TV ad business is growing rapidly, with GroupM, the world's biggest media investment firm, expecting ad revenue to reach $38.3 billion this year, a 20.1 percent year-over-year increase.
That trend has pushed TV OS operators, from Vizio and Roku to Samsung and LG, to seek new ways to incorporate ads and tracking into their TV software. Now, an ad tech giant is planning to become a TV OS provider itself.
