Major players including Pluto TV, Roku TV, Tubi and Vizio increased their FAST offerings but only by single digit percentages, while Amazon’s Freevee, Samsung TV Plus and Sling Freestream ramped up offerings by adding 152, 73 and 176 net channels respectively.

NFL+ offering includes a live stream of NFL Network and NFL RedZone, in addition to access to live preseason games, live local and primetime regular season and postseason games (via phone and tablet only), live local and national audio for every game, NFL Films’ archives and more.

The Walt Disney Company-operated leading sports streaming platform, ESPN+ and the ESPN app, has launched on CTV operator, VIZIO, ahead of the return of the new NFL season. The launch also comes as part of Disney Bundle Trio, which includes access to Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+

The ISA will focus on the key areas measurement, distribution, and demand that all provide opportunity and challenge for independent streamers in the marketplace.

Measurement will help establish the overall reach of alliance members and work to establish collective value for platforms and brand marketers, including working with 3P measurement providers, aggregating viewership, and jointly messaging the virtues of the alliance that promotes our value to platforms and brand marketers.

“We believe that shopping is an integral part of our daily lives, and we are committed to bringing convenience and innovation to Vizio Smart TVs,” said Chris Tanquary, senior director of business development at Vizio.

Dan Loewenberg, VP, media partnerships, iSpot, said: “Brands understand there are unique and valuable audiences consuming premium content on streaming properties, but need independent, reliable measurement to scale investments across linear and streaming with confidence.”

CTV operator Vizio has launched the app of the low-cost family-targeted TV provider Frndly TV across its Vizio Smart TVs.

Frndly TV offers 45 live TV networks including A+E, Hallmark Channel, The History Channel, MeTV, Lifetime, INSP, Game Show Network, Movies!, GAC Family and others. In addition to over 1000 hours of on-demand shows and movies that is focused on feel-good programming.

Revry is the only LGBTQ-first media network dedicated to the authentic representation of the queer community. Revry’s free ad-supported TV service and on-demand LGBTQ+ movies, series, news and music inspire the exploration of original and classic queer programming for audiences worldwide.

Revry with LGBTQ+ centered content across movies, series, news, and music and wedding channel Love Stories TV also joins the platform.

The competition to secure an edge in the AVOD/FAST ad market is likely to be a key issue in coming years. A recent report form TVREV suggested that this sector will generate around $42bn in ad revenue in the US alone by 2027. A separate analysis by Blue Ant International and OMDIA predicts the UK’s premium online ad-supported video market will hit $3bn by 2027 – of which $500m will go to FAST channels.

Among the new streaming channels are Portlandia, MSG Sports Zone, AMC en Espanol, Allblk Gems and Overtime. More than 150 AMC on demand feature films will also be available on VIZIO’s free streaming service, WatchFree+.

One obvious obstacle to the expansion of Samsung TV Plus is that some other smart TV manufacturers have already launched their own content platforms, LG and Vizio being notable examples. The big opportunity for Samsung would presumably be to embed its platform with high penetration Chinese firms like TCL.

With My Watchlist, Vizio says that a user can build a queue of TV shows and movies across premium services including Apple TV+, discovery+, Disney+, HBO Max, Hulu, Paramount+, Prime Video, Starz, WatchFree+ and others. “This solves one of the biggest challenges viewers have in today’s fragmented streaming environment—keeping up with what is available on which service,” said Vizio in a statement.