How COVID-19 Quarantine Locked In Connected TV Growth

If you’ve been navigating the historic transformation of the media business in recent years, from consumer behavior to technology to marketing strategy to shifting business models, you can feel how much faster the winds of change have been blowing since the onset of COVID-19.

What does that seismic change look like inside of the still-emerging world of Connected TV not just at subscription-only services such as Netflix and Disney+ but in the free, advertiser-supported segment? And what does that mean for the future of CTV as well as the traditional multichannel TV world? I went deep with a few of the executives leading the construction of the CTV infrastructure to better gauge the depth and impact of the shifting winds.

Unquestionably, the sudden surge in consumer, content producer and advertiser activity in CTV has put heightened stresses into that relatively young system. But Jack Perry, CEO of Syncbak, a company that manages complex CTV operations for hundreds of broadcast stations throughout the country, told me that as an entrepreneur “our company is built for the stressful times. I get worried when we aren’t stressed.” One of the consistent themes I heard in my discussions was how well the CTV infrastructure was adapting to the flood of new activity.