Anthony Wood (businessman)

Last updated
Anthony Wood
Anthony Wood at Collision Conference 2016 (cropped).jpg
Born1965or1966(age 57–58)
England
NationalityAmerican
Education Texas A&M University
OccupationBusinessman
Known forFounder, chairman and CEO of Roku, Inc.
SpouseSusan Wood
Children3

Anthony J. Wood (born 1965) is an English-born American billionaire businessman who is the founder, chairman and CEO of Roku, Inc. [1] [2] [3] As on April 2021, he owned 15% stake in Roku, and had a net worth of US$7.2 billion. [4]

Contents

Personal life

Wood was born and grew up in Manchester, England, followed by the State of Georgia in the U.S. [1] At the age of 13, he moved to the Netherlands with family, and then lived in Texas in the U.S. [5]

In 1984, when Wood was a teenager, he published "Lunar Lander" in the Ahoy! magazine. [6] Wood earned a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Texas A&M University. [7] He met his wife Susan at this university, where Susan studied environmental design. [5] They have three children, [8] and live in Palo Alto, California. [9]

Career

While in college, Wood founded his first company, "AW Software", to sell computer programs. He also founded "SunRize Industries" while studying engineering, developing software and hardware for the Amiga. [5] [10] [11] After graduating, he founded SunRize version 2. Later, in 1995, Wood launched another company, iBand, which was bought by Macromedia for $36 million. Wood became the vice president of Internet authoring at Macromedia. [12]

Wood left Macromedia in September 1997 to launch ReplayTV, a digital video recorder (DVR) maker. [13] Wood began working on the DVR development reportedly after being "frustrated" at missing episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation. [12] Features introduced by ReplayTV included ad-skipping, rewinding and pausing live television. [14] [15] Wood sold ReplayTV in 2002 to SONICblue Incorporated for US$42 million. [15]

In 2002, Wood founded Roku, Inc., his sixth startup, to market home digital devices. "Roku" means “six” in Japanese. [13] In 2007 Netflix, Inc. employed Wood as the vice president of Netflix's "Internet TV", directly under Reed Hastings. [15] Wood continued to be the CEO of Roku in this period. [2] At Netflix, he built a team which developed a Netflix-streaming player as well as applications allowing PC users to stream Netflix onto their computers. Netflix later spun Wood’s engineering team back out to Roku. [13]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amiga</span> Family of personal computers sold by Commodore

Amiga is a family of personal computers introduced by Commodore in 1985. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16- or 16/32-bit processors, 256 KB or more of RAM, mouse-based GUIs, and significantly improved graphics and audio compared to previous 8-bit systems. These systems include the Atari ST—released earlier the same year—as well as the Macintosh and Acorn Archimedes. Based on the Motorola 68000 microprocessor, the Amiga differs from its contemporaries through the inclusion of custom hardware to accelerate graphics and sound, including sprites and a blitter, and a pre-emptive multitasking operating system called AmigaOS.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">TiVo</span> Series of digital video recorders

TiVo is a digital video recorder (DVR) developed and marketed by Xperi and introduced in 1999. TiVo provides an on-screen guide of scheduled broadcast programming television programs, whose features include "OnePass" schedules which record every new episode of a series, and "WishList" searches which allow the user to find and record shows that match their interests by title, actor, director, category, or keyword. TiVo also provides a range of features when the TiVo DVR is connected to a home network, including film and TV show downloads, advanced search, online scheduling, and at one time, personal photo viewing and local music playback.

NewTek, Inc., is a San Antonio, Texas–based hardware and software company that produces live and post-production video tools and visual imaging software for personal computers. The company was founded in 1985 in Topeka, Kansas, United States, by Tim Jenison and Paul Montgomery. On April 1, 2019, it was announced that NewTek would be acquired by Vizrt.

ReplayTV was a former DVR company that from 1999 until 2005, produced a brand of digital video recorders (DVR), a term synonymous with personal video recorder (PVR). It is a consumer video device which allows users to capture television programming to internal hard disk storage for later viewing. ReplayTV was founded in September 1997 by future Roku founder Anthony Wood, who was president and CEO of ReplayTV until August 2001.

A digital video recorder (DVR) is an electronic device that records video in a digital format to a disk drive, USB flash drive, SD memory card, SSD or other local or networked mass storage device. The term includes set-top boxes (STB) with direct to disk recording, portable media players and TV gateways with recording capability, and digital camcorders. Personal computers are often connected to video capture devices and used as DVRs; in such cases the application software used to record video is an integral part of the DVR. Many DVRs are classified as consumer electronic devices; such devices may alternatively be referred to as personal video recorders (PVRs), particularly in Canada. Similar small devices with built-in displays and SSD support may be used for professional film or video production, as these recorders often do not have the limitations that built-in recorders in cameras have, offering wider codec support, the removal of recording time limitations and higher bitrates.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Teaching Company</span> The Teaching Company audiovisual college courses

The Teaching Company, doing business as Wondrium, is a media production company that produces educational, video, and audio content in the form of courses, documentaries, and series under two content brands: Wondrium and The Great Courses. The company distributes their content globally through a mix of Direct to Consumer models, such as their streaming service Wondrium.com and TheGreatCourses.com, as well as distribution through third party platforms like the Apple TV app, Audible, Amazon Prime, and Roku.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Home theater PC</span> PC meant to be used in a home theater setting

A home theater PC (HTPC) or media center computer is a convergent device that combines some or all the capabilities of a personal computer with a software application that focuses on video, photo, audio playback, and sometimes video recording functionality. Since the mid-2000s, other types of consumer electronics, including game consoles and dedicated media devices, have crossed over to manage video and music content. The term "media center" also refers to specialized application software designed to run on standard personal computers.

Streaming television is the digital distribution of television content, such as television shows and films, as streaming media delivered over the Internet. Streaming television stands in contrast to dedicated terrestrial television delivered by over-the-air aerial systems, cable television, and/or satellite television systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Moxi (DVR)</span>

Moxi was a line of high-definition digital video recorders produced by Moxi Digital Digeo and Arris International. Moxi was originally released only to cable operators, but in December 2008 it was released as a retail product. Moxi was removed from the market in November 2011. The former retail product, the Moxi HD DVR, provided a high-definition user interface with support for either two or three CableCARD TV tuners. Arris also offered a companion appliance, the Moxi Mate, which could stream live or recorded TV from a Moxi HD DVR.

The Technology and Engineering Emmy Awards, or Technology and Engineering Emmys, are one of two sets of Emmy Awards that are presented for outstanding achievement in engineering development in the television industry. The Technology and Engineering Emmy Awards are presented by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS), while the separate Primetime Engineering Emmy Awards are given by its sister organization the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roku, Inc.</span> American technology company

Roku, Inc. is a U.S. public company founded by Anthony Wood in 2002. It runs a streaming TV service through its branded streaming devices and smart TVs, supporting both advertising and subscription models on its platform. Roku leads U.S. streaming TV distribution, and reports over 80 million users globally as of 2023. Beyond the U.S., the company serves markets in Canada, Australia, the U.K., France, Germany, and several Latin American countries including Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru.

Monsoon Multimedia was a company that manufactured, developed and sold video streaming and place-shifting devices that allowed consumers to view and control live television on PCs connected to a local (home) network or remotely from a broadband-connected PC or mobile phone. It was one of 5 major transformations initiated by Prabhat Jain, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur with 5 undergraduate and post graduate engineering degrees from Cal Berkeley and Univ of Vienna, Austria. On the even of Cisco acquiring Monsoon in 2017, EchoStar, the new parent of Sling sued Monsoon for patent infringement, having obtained confidential information about the date of the acquisition by Cisco from a Monsoon employee under murky circumstances. Monsoon settled the lawsuit by agreeing not to sell its products in the USA simply because it did not have the legal funds to fight mighty Echostar's legal maneuvers. EchoStar thus successfully removed its only competitor from the market place. This meant Monsoon's death knell.

Commercial skipping is a feature of some digital video recorders that makes it possible to automatically skip commercials in recorded programs. This feature created controversy, with major television networks and movie studios claiming it violates copyright and should be banned.

PlayOn is a streaming media brand and software suite that enables users to view and record videos from numerous online content providers. The suite consists of two main products: PlayOn Cloud and PlayOn Desktop. PlayOn Cloud is an online service for recording digital video streams, accessible via native iOS or Android mobile device applications. PlayOn Desktop is Windows-based software that acts as a streaming dashboard and hub on the PC. The available streaming websites are organized as channels in both products. Users browse through or search the video content found in those channels in order to record the videos for later viewing. PlayOn Desktop allows watching the videos real-time on the PC, or casting the videos to a TV via a streaming device or gaming console.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roku</span> Brand of streaming media players

Roku is a brand of smart TV operating systems, smart TVs, streaming devices, and smart home and audio products designed and marketed by Roku, Inc., headquartered in San Jose, California, United States. Roku's smart TV products primarily offer access to streaming media content, including streaming television, from online services.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sling TV</span> American streaming television service

Sling TV is an American streaming television service operated by Sling TV LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dish Network. Unveiled on January 5, 2015, at the Consumer Electronics Show, the virtual multichannel video programming distributor aims to complement subscription video on demand services for cord cutters, offering a selection of major cable channels and OTT-originated services that can be streamed through smart TVs, digital media players and apps. The service is available in the United States and Puerto Rico as of 2015.

HBO Now was an American subscription video on demand streaming service for premium television network HBO owned by WarnerMedia subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc. Officially unveiled on March 9 and launched on April 7, 2015, the service allowed subscribers on-demand access to HBO's library of original programs, films and other content on personal computers, smartphones, tablet devices and digital media players. Unlike HBO Go, HBO's online video on demand service for existing subscribers of the linear television channel, HBO Now was available as a standalone service and does not require a television subscription to use, targeting cord cutters who use competing services such as Netflix and Hulu. As of February 2018, HBO Now had 5 million subscribers.

AOMedia Video 1 (AV1) is an open, royalty-free video coding format initially designed for video transmissions over the Internet. It was developed as a successor to VP9 by the Alliance for Open Media (AOMedia), a consortium founded in 2015 that includes semiconductor firms, video on demand providers, video content producers, software development companies and web browser vendors. The AV1 bitstream specification includes a reference video codec. In 2018, Facebook conducted testing that approximated real-world conditions, and the AV1 reference encoder achieved 34%, 46.2%, and 50.3% higher data compression than libvpx-vp9, x264 High profile, and x264 Main profile respectively.

The Apple TV app is a line of media player software programs developed by Apple Inc. for viewing television shows and films delivered by Apple to consumer electronic devices. It can stream content from the iTunes Store, the Apple TV Channels a la carte video on demand service, and the Apple TV+ original content subscription service. On iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Vision Pro, and Apple TV devices it can also index and access content from linked apps of other video on demand services.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Roku Channel</span> Free streaming video service

The Roku Channel is an over-the-top video streaming service owned and operated by Roku, Inc. Launched in September 2017, the service is offered in the U.S., Canada, the U.K. and Mexico. The Roku Channel tops U.S. viewership for free ad-supported streaming TV, and reports 120 million viewers as of 2023.

References

  1. 1 2 "Anthony Wood". InfluenceWatch. Retrieved 2024-02-23.
  2. 1 2 Sherman, Alex (2021-06-18). "How Roku used the Netflix playbook to beat bigger players and rule streaming video". CNBC. Retrieved 2024-02-23.
  3. Szalai, Georg (2023-09-06). "Roku to Lay Off 10 Percent of Staff, Take Charge of $55M-$65M for Removing Streaming Content". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 2024-02-23.
  4. Tucker, Hank (2021-04-29). "Zuckerberg, Dorsey And 18 Other Billionaires Lead Massive Stock Sales". Forbes. Retrieved 2024-02-23.
  5. 1 2 3 "Trailblazers - True Vision - Texas A&M Foundation Spirit Magazine" . Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  6. Wood, Anthony (April 1984). "Lunar Lander". Ahoy! . Ion International. pp. 35, 76. ISSN   8750-4383.
  7. "Executive Profile: Anthony J. Wood". Bloomberg LP. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  8. "How Roku is kicking the cable industry's butt & where it's going next [exclusive] - VentureBeat". venturebeat.com. 3 March 2012. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  9. Evangelista, Benny (2012-04-16). "Roku pins TV's future on Internet streaming". sfgate.com. Hearst Communications, Inc. Retrieved 2024-02-23.
  10. "Perfect Sound". Amiga Hardware Database.
  11. "Samplers /SunRize Industries: Perfect Sound". Big Book of Amiga Hardware.
  12. 1 2 "This Is the Man Responsible for Your Binge-Watching Addiction". Fortune. Retrieved 2024-01-07.
  13. 1 2 3 Hiltzik, Michael (October 13, 2010). "Roku box developer has a sixth sense about video". LA Times.
  14. Hiltzik, Michael (October 13, 2010). "Roku box developer has a sixth sense about video". LA Times.
  15. 1 2 3 Au-Yeung, Angel. "How Billionaire Anthony Wood Quit His Netflix Job, Founded Roku—And Then Quadrupled His Fortune In The Past Year". Forbes. Retrieved 2024-01-07.