It’s becoming a trend for smartphone brands to release TVs, as OnePlus, Xiaomi and now Motorola are doing it. OnePlus is due to unveil its own Smart TV this month, so Motorola effectively beat it to the punch. With all the hoopla around Apple TV+ (the service), I think it’s important to remember that Google’s Android TV platform powers about two dozen Smart TV and streaming device brands and over 30 cable companies worldwide.
The video business is not like the television business. TV has two basic business models. You pay (subscription). Someone else pays (advertiser supported). Sometimes these models are combined. That’s the entire story of TV revenue.
Video is another thing entirely. Amazon uses video to acquire customers (and their data). Apple uses video to sell hardware. Google and Facebook use video to acquire behavioral data to assist in the delivery of hyper-targeted advertising. Netflix has a premium-cable-like subscription model, but acquires behavioral data for hyper-targeted programming.
As you go down the list of business models for video distributors, you will quickly realize that while video is the common thread, most of the organizations in the “video business” are using video with different business objectives in mind.
A long way of saying, Apple TV+ will benefit from the tyranny of incumbency, but in the end, it’s a hardware (ecosystem) play — and it will be a good one. But it’s a big world and Moto and Xiaomi are incumbents too.
Author’s note: This is not a sponsored post. I am the author of this article and it expresses my own opinions. I am not, nor is my company, receiving compensation for it.
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