Vudu Becomes Roku’s Official Movie and TV Store, as Fandango Kills Off FandangoNow Brand
After more than five years, FandangoNow is going away.
Fandango, NBCUniversal’s movie-ticketing and home entertainment division, has merged FandangoNow with Vudu, the movie and TV rental and electronic sell-through service it bought from Wal-Mart last year.
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Starting Tuesday, the newly updated Vudu will replace FandangoNow as the official movie and TV store on Roku. Vudu uses Roku Pay, the streaming platform’s in-app payment system. In addition, FandangoNow customers can now transfer their accounts and movie and TV collections to Vudu.
Fandango acquired digital-entertainment provider M-Go in 2016 from Technicolor and DreamWorks Animation, which it renamed FandangoNow. Fandango inherited M-Go’s deal with Roku to be the default movie and TV store on Roku’s platform, originally inked in 2013.
Fanango execs concluded that Vudu had stronger brand-name recognition than FandangoNow. In a statement, Fandango said, “By bringing its two services together on Vudu, Fandango will be able to rapidly innovate and make bolder, faster enhancements to benefit consumers and partners, especially important during an ever-changing media landscape.” Major Vudu competitors include Apple, Amazon and Google.
The consolidated Vudu service had more than 60 million registered users and offers more than 200,000 new-release and catalog titles to rent or buy, including what Fandango claims is the largest collection of 4K Ultra HD titles as well as several thousand titles to watch for free (with ads). Vudu is available in more than 75 million U.S. TV-connected device households, according to the NPD Group.
Roku is “thrilled to continue our long-standing partnership with Fandango as we build a future where all TV will be streamed by creating a seamless experience for users to discover and enjoy premium video on-demand releases,” said Tedd Cittadine, Roku’s VP of content partnerships.
Top new releases available on Vudu currently include “F9: The Fast Saga,” Pixar’s “Luca,” “The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It,” “Peter Rabbit 2,” “The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard,” “A Quiet Place Part II,” Disney’s “Cruella,” “Godzilla vs. Kong” and “In the Heights.” Arriving next Tuesday (Aug. 10) on Vudu is Marvel’s “Black Widow” for rent or purchase.
Vudu is available on platforms and devices including Samsung, LG and Vizio smart TVs, the Roku platform, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Comcast’s Xfinity X1 and Xfinity Flex, Sony PlayStation, Microsoft Xbox and Tivo.
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