Walmart and Roku Debut First-of-its-Kind Partnership to Bring Commerce to TV Ads

BENTONVILLE, Ark. & SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Walmart (NYSE: WMT) and Roku, Inc. (Nasdaq: ROKU) announced today a first-of-its-kind partnership to make TV streaming the next e-commerce shopping destination. Walmart will be the exclusive retailer to enable streamers to purchase featured products fulfilled by Walmart directly on Roku, America’s #1 TV streaming platform*.

This unique partnership evolves shopping beyond the QR code and will change the way customers interact and shop TV and video content. The new experience offers product discovery with a seamless checkout experience, enabling purchase directly at the time of inspiration.

“We’re working to connect with customers where they are already spending time, shortening the distance from discovery and inspiration to purchase,” said William White, chief marketing officer, Walmart. “No one has cracked the code around video shoppability. By working with Roku, we’re the first to market retailer to bring customers a new shoppable experience and seamless checkout on the largest screen in their homes – their TV.”

Walmart is unmatched in the ability to evaluate customer behaviors and then scale commerce offerings to customers where and how they want to shop, including during moments of entertainment. Roku’s purpose-built advertising tech stack will bring all the benefits of streaming TV advertising – targeting, optimization, and measurement – to the commerce partnership. This first pilot program fuses entertainment with the transactional world of commerce, unlocking an innovative and inspiring in-platform buying experience for customers that will continue to evolve.

Viewers simply press “OK” with the remote on a shoppable ad and proceed to checkout with their payment details easily pre-populated from Roku Pay, Roku’s payments platform. From there, tapping “OK” on the Walmart checkout page places the order. A Walmart purchase confirmation is then emailed with shipping, return, and support information.

“We’re making shopping on TV as easy as it is on social,” said Peter Hamilton, Head of TV Commerce, Roku. “For years, streamers have purchased new Roku devices and signed up for millions of subscriptions with their Roku remote. Streaming commerce brings that same ease and convenience to marketers and shoppers.”

OneView, Roku’s ad-buying platform for TV streaming, will have the exclusive capability to activate and measure these shoppable ads. Additionally, marketers will be able to use Roku Brand Studio to design custom creative and branded content built for TV streaming and shopping.

Future iterations of this pilot will look for opportunities to build deeper commerce experiences that meet customers where they are.

To learn more about shoppable ads, visit https://go.roku.com/wc9BQvTer.

About Walmart

Walmart Inc. (NYSE: WMT) helps people around the world save money and live better — anytime and anywhere — in retail stores, online, and through their mobile devices. Each week, approximately 230 million customers and members visit more than 10,500 stores and clubs under 46 banners in 24 countries and eCommerce websites. With fiscal year 2022 revenue of $573 billion, Walmart employs approximately 2.3 million associates worldwide. Walmart continues to be a leader in sustainability, corporate philanthropy and employment opportunity. Additional information about Walmart can be found by visiting corporate.walmart.com, on Facebook at facebook.com/walmart and on Twitter at twitter.com/walmart.

About Roku, Inc.

Roku pioneered streaming to the TV. We connect users to the streaming content they love, enable content publishers to build and monetize large audiences, and provide advertisers with unique capabilities to engage consumers. Roku streaming players and TV-related audio devices are available in the U.S. and in select countries through direct retail sales and licensing arrangements with service operators. Roku TV™ models are available in the U.S. and in select countries through licensing arrangements with TV OEM brands. Roku is headquartered in San Jose, Calif. U.S.A.

*America’s No. 1 TV streaming platform” is based on hours streamed according to Hypothesis Group, October 2021

This press release contains "forward-looking" statements that are based on our beliefs and assumptions and on information currently available to us on the date of this press release. Forward-looking statements may involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause our actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from those expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. These statements include but are not limited to the timing, availability, and benefits of the Walmart and Roku partnership; trends related to TV streaming and advertising; the features and benefits of the OneView ad platform; and the features, benefits, growth, and reach of the Roku platform. Except as required by law, we assume no obligation to update these forward-looking statements publicly, or to update the reasons actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements, even if new information becomes available in the future. Important factors that could cause our actual results to differ materially are detailed from time to time in the reports Roku, Inc. files with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2020 and our Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 30, 2021. Copies of reports filed with the SEC are posted on Roku’s website and are available from Roku without charge.

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