Partnerships will be critical to remain relevant in an increasingly complex landscape
New forms of bundling, connected TV ecosystems, retail media, and cross-media IP strategies promise growth, but also tension: all require new kinds of partnerships.
Online video providers have long relied on partnerships with mobile, broadband and pay TV operators to win and keep subscribers. In 2025, bundling strategies will both take on new forms and recruit new kinds of partners.Operator and online video partnerships are by far the most common but are becoming less and less “one-size-fits-all”, with features and methods for acquiring and monetizing subscribers varying by market circumstances and service provider strategies.In addition, online aggregators such as Amazon’s and Roku’s “Channels” stores will become progressively more important as consumers increasingly turn to connected TV platforms to access and discover TV content and apps.Streamers will also experiment with partnering with each other. Some will package video with other media, such as Hulu with Spotify. Others will involve direct rivals, such as Disney and Warner Bros Discovery’s bundle of Disney+, Hulu, and Max.Partnerships with credit card providers, banks, retailers, device vendors, and consumer goods brands will provide additional routes to acquire subscribers, albeit at a smaller scale.All online video providers will need to keep winning subscribers by themselves. Most consumers will still purchase subscriptions direct from their providers – though percentages will vary greatly by country.
With more than a dozen CTV operating systems (OS) in play, their operators will employ various tactics to bring much-needed consolidation to the market in 2025.CTV OS will be central to an array of future media strategies, including—but not limited to—direct-to-consumer video, super-aggregation, advertising ecosystems, e-commerce, and shoppable TV.But their effectiveness and efficiency – for app providers, advertisers, retailers, and their operators – will depend on their reach. Even the largest markets won’t offer enough eyeballs and ad dollars to share among dozens of OS.
In 2025, retailer partnerships will become increasingly important, partly so operators can secure in-store and online shelf-space for TV sets featuring their OS.In return, operators will increasingly support retailers’ advertising ambitions, by integrating their platforms to enable mutual sharing of their first-party data about their customers and “shoppable TV” features.Also, Omdia expects OS players to pursue merges and acquisitions (M&A), following retailer Walmart’s 2024 buy of smart TV vendor Vizio. Such moves could enable providers to transform their market shares overnight, by performing over-the-air updates to switch TV sets to their OS.Various vendors will also seek to get in the “back door”, with more advanced HDMI streaming sticks, dongles, and pucks. We expect these strategies to be less successful, now that TV sets have caught up in terms of smart features.
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