Movie ticketing company Fandango has agreed to buy Walmart’s on-demand video streaming service, Vudu, for an undisclosed sum. The video service today reaches more than 100 million living room devices across the U.S., including smart TVs, Blu-ray players, game consoles and other over-the-top streaming devices, as well as Windows 10 and Mac computers, and iOS and Android mobile devices.
In announcing the deal, Vudu said nothing about its experience will be immediately changing – movie and television libraries are safe and you’ll continue to have access to all of your Vudu apps across your preferred devices. In the months ahead, however, Fandango will explore the possibility of integrating Vudu with FandangoNow.
Walmart acquired Vudu in early 2010 for a reported $100 million, bolstering it over the years with the addition of TV shows and even its own branded streaming hardware. Walmart added thousands of free movies and television shows to the platform in 2016 but even still, the service never really seemed to garner the same level of traction as rivals like Netflix and Hulu.
For Fandango, the acquisition could really help right now considering movie theaters are by and large all shut down due to Covid-19 containment strategies. But even before today, the company has already taken steps to pivot, foregoing the theatrical launch of Trolls World Tour in favor of a streaming release.
Walmart has seen a surge of interest in its e-commerce operations as a result of the pandemic. The company’s focus now is on hiring to fulfill consumer demand for online shopping and grocery. It has already hired 150,000 new workers and is hiring another 50,000, it said last week.
The Fandango acquisition is expected to close in the months ahead, says Walmart.
