Facebook has already begun digging into the TV space with Facebook Watch, so what might the social media company’s next move in video be?
Jesse Redniss, Chief Innovation Officer of Turner’s TBS and TNT networks, predicts the company might buy Roku.
“Facebook has been trying to be getting into the video space for quite sometime now,” he told Cheddar in a recent interview. “When you look at Facebook’s track record of growth, the acquisition of Insta, WhatsApp, Oculus. In some ways, in order for them to really scale into a marketplace, it’ll make a lot of sense for them to buy one of the leaders in a marketplace they want to get into.”
Roku shares fell steeply Friday after Goldman Sachs downgraded the stock, saying the streaming company is overvalued. Still, the company is trading well above its IPO price, and posted a 48 percent increase in active accounts in the third quarter, as well as a 58 percent increase in streaming hours.
For full interview [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/a-bold-prediction-on-why-facebook-would-acquire-roku).
Disney's new streaming service and its acquisition of Fox assets will be the main fixation when the entertainment giant reports earnings and revenue after market close on Thursday.
Elon Musk will have someone to answer to at Tesla. The electric carmaker announced late Wednesday that Robyn Denholm would take Musk's place as chair of the board. Denholm, a Tesla board member, will leave her job as chief financial officer of Telstra, an Australian telco giant and inherit Musk's chairman duties full-time in six months when her notice period is complete.
Ford, the century-old automaker that all but invented the concept of the modern car, said it would acquire e-scooter start-up Spin as part of a broad re-positioning of the company as a mobility services provider in an era when car ownership is but one of many options for getting around. Cheddar discussed the strategy behind the acquisition with Sunny Madra, the vice president of tech incubator Ford X, and Euwyn Poon, the co-founder and president of Spin.
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Adrian Lovett, president and CEO of the non-profit Web Foundation, told Cheddar's Alex Heath why the rate of people getting online for the first time is becoming stagnant.
Services aren't just for tech companies ー retailers are also latching onto the recurring revenue trend. And for industry vet Office Depot, the services model promises serious growth. "We are not a retailer, we are an omni-channel company," Office Depot CEO Gerry Smith told Cheddar, underscoring the importance of services revenue and Office Depot's business-to-business division.
Microsoft will continue to provide technology to U.S. agencies and the military, despite the objections raised by employees over how the products are being used, specifically with regard to immigration and border control. "We will be proactive in using our voice," said Microsoft President Brad Smith, speaking to Cheddar from the 2018 Web Summit in Lisbon, Portugal. "We think we'll be more persuasive if we're engaged than if we withdraw."
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Political fixer-turned VC Bradley Tusk doesn't think it's sufficient to just bring voters to the polls ー he wants to bring the polls to them. "We know, fundamentally, democracy works when a lot of people vote, and it really doesn't work when very few people vote," Tusk told Cheddar on Tuesday.
Incoming Intuit CEO Sasan Goodarzi, currently the company's EVP of small business, tells Cheddar that the software company plans to lean on its open platform and innovations in artificial intelligence to put more money in the pockets of its customers. "There is not enough we could do for our customers," Goodarzi said Tuesday.
