Roku will stop selling smart home devices and refocus on streaming
The company will stop selling video doorbells, its home monitoring system and other products.
Roku, the streaming service provider, is exiting the smart home device market and refocusing its efforts on streaming. The company announced this decision shortly after Fox completed its $22 billion takeover of Roku. In a statement, a Roku spokesperson said that they are "sharpening our focus on Roku's core mission: being the top streaming platform."
As part of this shift, Roku plans to wind down sales of its smart home hardware and provide continued support and services for its existing smart home products. Currently, only two of Roku's smart home devices are available for purchase: the Roku Indoor Camera 360° and the Video Doorbell & Chime. Products such as smart light strips and bulbs, wireless video doorbells, other cameras, smart plugs, and Roku's home monitoring system are out of stock and no longer available at many third-party retailers.
Roku has been gradually shifting away from its smart home products for the past several months, with the company ceasing to mention such devices in its earnings reports earlier this year. Roku began entering the smart home market in 2022 with rebadged versions of Wyze products and started releasing its own smart home hardware last year.
The company's decision to refocus on streaming is a business move, as Roku's hardware losses have more than doubled in the past quarter, from $22.9 million to $48.6 million, largely due to increased costs of memory components. Despite this, Roku's device revenue, which includes its own TVs, exceeded expectations in the latest quarter. Roku has since introduced its first OLED sets.
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