Axios’ Sara Fischer in conversation with Roku Media’s Charlie Collier

So for those of you who don't know, Charlie came from Fox. Charlie was the president of Fox Entertainment, and he was a Hollywood guy. Now he's back to being in the East Coast. We're both very miserable jets fans together.

That's true.

So when we have these sports conversations, I wanted to make sure we talked about three very different types of sports. We were talking about the NBA with NBC. Anjali and I were just talking a lot about football. And Roku has dabbled in live rights of its own with the MLB and with baseball. So, Charlie, why did you decide to experiment with baseball? And what does that deal look like, by the way?

First of all, thank you for having me. And how awful that every time we speak together, she leads with the Jets. So that is in a sports room. It's a cry for help. We admit it. Well, look, I would slightly disagree with the supposition that we dabble in sports because every single sporting event, every single in television is on the Roku platform. You had Mark and Mike up here first. We drove more people to the Olympics. We partnered proudly with the Olympics. For those who don't know what Roku is, Roku is the number one television operating system in the U.S. canada, and Mexico. We're a global platform. And what we do is we're the front door to television. We very much root for Anjali and root for Mike and Mark, and what we do is build platforms that elevate their programming. I thought it was interesting you had one of the greatest sportscasters in the world saying, it's a buffet. And we host the buffet. Right. And we help be the lead in to everything that's been mentioned. We drove more people to the super bowl on Tubi than anybody. And we take great pride in their partnership and the promotion, and that's what we do. You say, I used to be a Hollywood guy. I love Hollywood still. And this is my first programming job, which is half my head. I run all of Roku Media. There's a first programming job where I can root for everybody's programming and then build the platform that helps you find it. If Mike got up here and had to say Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, really what will happen is we have the most simple, delightful way to find everything you want at scale. And so that's what we do. And yes, we have Major League Baseball. And it's been a great partnership.

It's so true that you're the front door to the Internet, the world of streaming. Rather like anything, any app that you need, you can get it through Your Roku and those apps all have live sports. So I appreciate that clarification on the live sports front though, on the rights, exclusive rights. That's the deal. I want to hear a little bit more about. Why did you decide that it was worth the investment and why the mlb?

It's a great question. So the mlb, I think first of all, they're terrific partners. And if you want to talk about dachshund shoulder programming, we do so much more than the live games. We actually just announced today we're doing a documentary on the history of the home run called Going, Going, Gone. And we're doing it with MLB Productions. It's a Roku original. Really excited for that. And of course we have the lead in game every Sunday. So if we're the lead in to television, to have the first game every Sunday that leads into the biggest sports day of the week is a really great place to teach people not just the game we've got, but everything that's happening in baseball and sports across really the sports universe. So it makes a lot of sense for our brand as the lead in to have the lead in game. And then we don't just have the games, we have a sports zone, which is where so many people found the Olympics or the super bowl or every other MLB game. We have highlights and clips, we have a fast channel, we have documentaries. And so all of a sudden, if you're a baseball fan, which I am, we want to not just elevate our game, but elevate everyone's game. And so you say you're a Jets fan, think about how many different players, places you'll have to go to watch that game. And what we do at Roku is make it simple and delightful to find it. And much easier than having to have someone explain the nights of the week.

Yes, much, much easier. When we think about your journey with live rights, baseball is obviously the most high profile. But you do a few others, like what is Roku's game plan for exploring live rights? Do you plan to do a lot more? Are you still in the experimental phase?

It's a great question actually. Anjali said you lead with the audience. I hope every leads with the audience and we go where there are areas of passion. And again, if you start with the fundamental premise that Roku is going to have everyone's programming, that's what we do in half the country. We're the front door to television. So then we have to say, okay, which rights can we elevate that are others and which rights are ours? And where can we go deeper? So we do have the X Games and that's a passionate audience that we know we can serve. When we saw the audience demand because of our data on the platform, of course that's a good investment for us. We have all sorts of women's sports and we have a women's sports zone and we invested in women's volleyball and we invested in women's soccer and really I think platforms like Ion that had the Caitlin Clark games as part of their package before Caitlin Clark blew up, we absolutely made sure that we got our viewers to those games on Ion. It wasn't our rights, but it was absolutely our right to elevate that pop cultural moment. I in the macro, if you step back the platforms by definition, and this was true in the phones, you think about it, you have an iOS or an Android, the platforms are bigger than the pieces on the platform. And so if the platform's bigger than the pieces, we're largely the app store for television with also we have the biggest AVOD service of them all. I mean Nielsen Gage came out yesterday. Roku channel. So not our platform, just the channel where we're an ad supported video on demand service is the biggest in the country. We represent over 5% of streaming and over 2% of all tele, 2 and a half percent of all television watching and we're growing first quarter to first quarter we were up 84% year over year. So the Trent, thank you for that applause. She doesn't even work for me. It's great. And so to have the scale of a publisher backed by the scale of a platform and be able to elevate all the programmers that I work with and appreciate and their product. That's what we do.

So then I'm going to ask you the same thing I asked Anjali because what Roku's mission is is a little bit different. You obviously have that AVOD ad supported free service, but then you are the operating system, the front door to the television and streaming universe. What is it that you use to measure success? Is it the number of OS users? Is it the amount of minutes that people spend in the Roku ecosystem? Mark Marshall said it was revenue. Is it ad revenue?

It's all of that. So we obviously were an ad support. AVOD means ad supported video on demand. So we're, we are an ad supported business and we're very proud of that business. But of course it's engagement, it's viewership. It is for me it's actually making sure there's still scale in television, if you think about our home screen reaches households with 125 million people in it every day. And so in a world of fragmentation, to have scale at the platform level, when you come to the front door, to engage people there. And by the way, we can engage them with short form or storytelling or just to help them find what they love, we can build content and experiences. So if you're a. I know there's a sports event, we have a sports zone. If you're a food fan, we have all things food, where all of our original programming and food at every food show you love across the history of television and current is available. And that organizing principle, in a world of fragmentation, in that buffet Mike Tirico talked about, we like to make sure you get what you want and then get a ton of stuff that we curate and create for you that surprise and delight you.

I always kind of think of it in my mind like a grocery store. Like, you know, you need to get certain ingredients. It's on the grocery store to make it as easy as possible to find the ingredients that you need. That's sort of what the Roku experience feels like to me.

Well, and I think it's great. I also think we are the. For the advertiser, we're the end. I'll display for the partner. We make sure that if they're investing in the super bowl on Tubi, we want our viewers to know where to find it. And so we're. We are the grocery store, but we also produce a heck of a lot of the produce as well.

Of course. And now produce, as you just mentioned, it's a lot of your own originals too.

Absolutely.

You guys actually bought this Old House like you bought a content company. Is that something we should expect more from you?

Look, we are always looking at opportunities to measure what the audience wants. Again, we have a huge fandom for All Things Home, which is the zone where something like this Old House would live. There are 40 plus seasons, plus we're making new ones, plus we're building Spanish language originals. They go into Mexico. We have so many opportunities to curate and elevate our own original storytelling, but then put it next to the creators and other curation that you'd be fascinated by. And that's why our engagement's growing, because we serve you a lot of what you're looking for and a ton of other things that elevate the experience.

I once had someone told me that I don't know if it was you or someone else from Roku That a measurement of success for Roku is when you're walking down a busy city street at night and you see purple coming out of the windows. That's how you know that Roku is killing it.

That sounds a little creepy. Purple is our screensaver. It's called Roku City. It was a screensaver. It, it's now an immersive, interactive, ad supported environment. Literally 40 million people a day plus will see Roku City. So even that platform within our platform has become a content expression. And you know, Anjali mentioned the social aspect of what we do. People are online and talking about what happens in Roku City. I think around once every nine to ten minutes just on what used to be a screensaver is now an ad supported platform. It's cool. And yes, you walk through Brooklyn and see a lot of purple.

So but what does that mean? Like somebody can buy McDonald's, can put their logo in a little building in Roku City. Is that the vibe?

No, we. And it's not just McDonald's. When Disney had its 100th anniversary, they rebuilt the Magic Kingdom in Roku City. There is, there happens to be a McDonald's. There's a home Depot there. But what's amazing about the platform, again, we have, you know, over 90 million logged on relationships, 90 million logged on users. And we really work to put the audience first and super serve them. And so our goal with everything we do is to put the right message in front of the right people at the right time. And it should be better for the viewer, it should be better for the partner. And frankly, it's great entertainment and fun for us. In the case of Roku City, I.

Think it's so fun and it's a great marketing tactic to be that bright purple. Everybody associates that with Roku. Charlie, we're here at Cannes. You've been to a bunch of cans before. This is not your first rodeo. I look down at the beach and it's all tech companies and it's a lot of streamers, right? We've got Netflix at the JW Marriott roof. Disney brought a life size Mickey here. What do you see as the role that streamers uniquely play here at Canon in the advertising community? Do you think that they've become more dominant than even then ad networks?

I think that even in that question, if we say where is the audience and where is it aggregating and who needs. In our case, we've had such great meetings this week with partners including Nielsen. By the way, how do we measure this properly? How do we Serve audiences properly. How do we help everyone on the beach scale? One of the really unique things about Roku is that again, when half the country comes through our front door, many, many of the tents you see, even we send more people to every app you just mentioned. We're great partners with Netflix, with Disney, with every app that exists. And so, yeah, our role with them is to make sure we can bring scale to what is a very different beach than it was just a few years ago.

Roku sounds like the most popular kid in Cannes right now.

Well, what's amazing is we're here on the French Riviera and you're listening to me. Is that not the biggest cry for help? By the way, I have a napkin here. Nielsen branded the napkins, and it says that 37% of ANHPI audiences reported wanting to see or hear more relevant ads when watching sports. So that's probably even a better answer. That's what we do for a lot of people on the beach.

That is a very good spin on that. Charlie, I appreciate you so much. There's a lot of incredible stats here. Just the fact that you have 40 million people a day engaging in Roku.

City, I would bet it's more. And that's one of the things we're talking to Nielsen about.

Nielsen can help you get there. You guys are reaching. That home screen reaches 125 million households.

You said households with 125, 25 million people in it every day. That's our front door. That's super bowl size reach every day. And that from there, we target and super serve.

It's really 90 million logged in users.

More than 90.

You guys are just out there. So let me think about what you guys are doing here at Cannes. You said live rights are something that you'll continue to explore. You've got the mlb, but you're doing more there. You guys have zones for passionate people. You have the Sports Zone where you're investing in women's sports, sports content. You were talking about having the home lover zone, but what I thought was so interesting is if you see a partner that has great content like Ion and Caitlin Clark and women's basketball, you're going to do your best job to push people there. Like you did your best job to push people to Tubi.

Absolutely. So that is what the Sports Zone does. It's not just we have a women's sports Zone, we have an NFL zone. And we have a great partnership with the NFL. We use their mark. It is a branded, beautiful space to drive people to their game, which is going to be in a lot of places. As you heard, we have an NBA zone. We have a Major League Baseball zone.

Is there a New York jets zone?

The New York jets zone is really hard to find.

Yeah.

I love the jets and I will tell you that even finding your. Actually here's a better example because we are a baseball rights holder. I take such great pride in helping people find a season that goes 150 plus games and it's on different places in know throughout the week. And the fact that I can turn on my television, go to the Roku Sports Zone and it tells me where it is today, where it's going to be tomorrow and it's one click away and easy. That's the best.

I'm sure the folks at NBC could definitely use that with their NBA rights.

We work with them on it. We will absolutely be helping them.

Charlie, thank you so much. And thank you so much to everybody at Nielsen, everyone that came out. We appreciate you and we look forward to seeing you at the rest of Cannes.