Streaming service company Roku Inc. (ROKU) announced that it is adding premium subscriptions to The Roku Channel. Roku customers will be able to watch both free ad-supported and paid premium content in one interface. Shares of Roku rose about 6% in Wednesday’s regular trading session.
Roku Channel was launched by the company in October 2017 as a free channel and became available on the web last summer. Roku Channel will feature premium content from its more than 25 subscription partners which include SHOWTIME, Starz, EPIX, Baeble Music, CollegeHumor’s DROPOUT, CuriosityStream and FitFusion. Compared to its competitor Amazon (AMZN) Prime service, Roku Channel will be missing the content from HBO.
The Roku Channel will continue to include free, ad-supported titles available without a subscription and all premium content will have a trial period of seven days. The Los Gatos, California-based firm is also updating its mobile app, which will enable customers to watch content from The Roku Channel.
Premium subscriptions and search capabilities on The Roku Channel will begin rolling out to select Roku devices in late January, with a phased rollout planned for early 2019. The Roku mobile app update will also begin rolling out to iOS and Android devices in late January.
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In the past 52 weeks, the set-top box company’s stock has traded between $26.30 and $77.57 and dropped 38%.