Roku revenue soared 73% in Q3 to $452 million on demand for TV streaming products, growth in advertising and expansion of content distribution partnerships, said the company in a Thursday shareholder letter. Advertisers “reassessed their TV upfront advertising commitments and moved significant portions of their investments to connected TV platforms like Roku,” said CEO Anthony Wood on a Thursday investor call. Advertising with Roku gave marketers additional reach over linear TV and capability to target advertising and measure effectiveness, said Wood. Some 97% of TV advertisers that spent $1 million or more with Roku in Q3 last year returned in the 2020 quarter; the company closed 2021 upfront deals with the six major agency holding companies at increased levels of commitment. Unit sales of Roku players jumped 57% year on year, the highest growth in seven years, while average selling price slipped 1%, said Chief Financial Officer Steve Louden on the call. Pivotal Research Group analyst Jeffrey Wlodarczak said in a Friday investor note that the “significant revenue beat” was due to a “favorable backdrop” of cord cutting, COVID-19 stay-at-home orders, “relatively few competitors in" direct-to-consumer aggregation and an election-driven advertising rebound. Q3's 2.9 million net new active subscriber accounts topped PRG’s forecast of 2.7 million. Wlodarczak maintained his view that Roku will be squeezed by Comcast, Cox and other traditional distributors “attacking the [over-the-top] aggregation opportunity.” Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter called Roku’s growth “sustainable” because most advertising remains on linear TV and “will continue to shift in Roku’s direction” as content moves to OTT platforms. Roku users streamed 14.8 billion hours in the quarter, up 54% year over year; streaming hours per active account grew 9%, after easing of pandemic-related restrictions in summer, said the company. The number of active accounts rose 43% to 46 million on strong player and Roku TV sales in U.S. and international markets. Average revenue per user rose 20% to $27. Roku again didn't provide quarterly guidance due to global COVID-19 resurgences and uncertainties about the holiday season and consumer spending levels. Louden said Q4 year-over-year revenue growth will be in line with the last few holiday seasons, in the mid-40% range. The company expects platform receipts to be about two-thirds of total Q4 revenue. Shares closed 12.6% higher Friday at $253.36.

Twitter should suspend President Donald Trump’s account for “repeated violations” of company policy by spreading election disinformation, Common Cause and the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law wrote CEO Jack Dorsey Thursday. The platform labeled as potentially misleading several tweets by the president about the election. Trump made unsubstantiated claims of victory in Pennsylvania, Georgia and North Carolina and about ballot processing violations, the groups wrote. Twitter and the White House didn’t comment.

TiVo announced application programming interface-based metadata technology to make it easier for consumers to find relevant programming and movies. It signed a multiyear extension and expansion of an agreement with Finnish digital services company Elisa Viihde for the tech, saying Wednesday the Deep Discovery package lets TV and video service providers, CE manufacturers and media companies “better maximize the value of their catalogs and drive conversion, engagement and loyalty.” Content is tagged with metadata like moods, tones, themes, weighted keywords, age descriptors and popularity.

The FCC Media Bureau OK'd TV market modification for KVMD Twentynine Palms, California, to include Los Angeles designated market area communities served by Charter Communications' Spectrum cable systems where KVMD currently isn't being carried on a mandatory basis. The order came Tuesday.

Microsoft gave a hat tip to Apple TV+ in a Monday announcement listing streaming apps that will be available on the Xbox Series S and Series X when the consoles go on sale Nov. 10. Other apps include Netflix, Disney+, HBO Max, Spotify, YouTube, YouTube TV, Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, NBC Peacock, Vudu, FandangoNow, Twitch, Sky Go, Now TV and Sky Ticket, it said. Apple TV+ goes live on the Xbox One the same day, Microsoft said.

Fox News, MSNBC, CNN, ESPN and TLC are the top five national nonbroadcast networks effective July 1 for purposes of FCC audio description rules that MVPD systems above a certain size provide 87.5 hours of audio description quarterly on channels carrying each of those networks, said a Media Bureau public notice Monday. It said the top five list is updated at three-year intervals to account for changes in Nielsen ratings.

The Supreme Court won't hear an appeal of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' reversal of a dismissal of a class-action antitrust complaint against DirecTV and the NFL over the MVPD's Sunday Ticket package (see 1908140015), but don't take that as backing the 9th Circuit decision, Justice Brett Kavanaugh said in a docket 19-1098 statement Monday. He said the 9th Circuit decision is "of such legal and economic significance" that it might warrant SCOTUS review, but the case being at the motion-to-dismiss stage "is a factor counseling against this Court’s review at this time." He said the 9th Circuit seemed to agree antitrust law might require teams to negotiate individual contracts for their own games with DirecTV, but "that conclusion appears to be in substantial tension with antitrust principles and precedents." Kavanaugh said the plaintiff sports bars and restaurants may not have antitrust standing to sue the NFL and the individual teams. He said the league, teams and DirecTV defendants "have substantial arguments on the law," and if they don't prevail at summary judgment or during trial, they can come back to SCOTUS with a new cert petition. Outside counsel for the defendants didn't comment. The court said Justice Amy Coney Barrett took no part in the consideration or decision on the petition for writ of certiorari.

Red Ventures completed its $500 million acquisition of CNET Media Group from ViacomCBS, said the buyer Friday. Red Ventures announced the deal in mid-September, saying it was “eager to invest” in CNET’s growth “with more personalized consumer experiences” so it could “reinvigorate” CNET's various brands.

Representatives of NCTA, NAB and media companies told FCC Wireless and International bureau staff that reimbursing the costs incumbent satellite operators face for burying integrated receiver decoder equipment is important to the C-band transition. “This equipment is essential to compressing programmer services and thereby enabling the freeing up of the lower 300 MHz in the C-band,” said a filing posted Friday in docket 18-122.

Though Imax will likely resume “impressive top and bottom-line growth,” 2021 may still be challenging, Colliers analyst Steven Frankel wrote investors Friday. With several high-profile Imax films delayed a year, the “blockbuster slate” looks “satisfactory,” said Frankel, but he expects significantly slower screen growth next year as theater partners look to shore up their financial positions. Crowds will return to theaters in North America and Europe once a COVID-19 vaccine is introduced, said Frankel, who expects Imax to resume market share expansion. Noting the company’s strong cash position, Frankel said results during pandemic-related theater closures and periods of low utilization “have little impact on our 2022 estimates.” Imax reported a 56% Q3 revenue drop Thursday (see 2010290060) to $37.3 million.