The 18th edition of the quarterly video trends report from search, recommendation and user experience firm TiVo has identified a TV industry in transition, with operators finding user bases who no longer will continue buying underused bundles of services.





The Q2 2017 Online Video and Pay-TV Trends Report, looking at TV trends in Canada and the US, found that in the second quarter of the year, almost four-fifths of people said they only wanted to pay for the cable channels they actually watch. In the US, the average price respondents are willing to pay for the top 20 channels is $29.97, almost 6% higher than in Q1, while in Canada that average price is $26.34 (just over 3% more than last quarter). Even though many of the top-rated networks available for free or via antenna over-the-air are among the most-wanted channels in à la carte packages, respondents confirmed they will pay a premium for valued channels.One of the other key findings related to the skinny bundle phenomenon which are now really taking off. In the survey, TiVo’s Data Science Team explored offerings from virtual multichannel video programming distributors (vMVPDs) such as Sling, PlayStation Vue, Hulu TV, DIRECTV Now, YouTube TV.As these companies are looking to appeal to consumers by offering smaller channel packages at a lower cost than traditional MVPDs, TiVO found that the current narrow concentration on sports and medium-to-large channel offerings in vMVPD skinny bundles met the needs of needs of less than half of all survey respondents. Rather than creating a limited number of offerings with too many unnecessary channels for their à la carte packages, TiVo believes vMVPDs are better off replacing lesser-desired channels with more popular ones in an expanded list of skinny bundle interest categories to gain more market share.The report findings also revealed those who wish to see next-generation user experiences, using features such as a carousel format, integrated into their channel guides increased slightly in the quarter. Although it noted that the number of respondents not interested in curated video content — that is favouring the traditional grid guide — held steady at just under half of respondents.