Comcast Cable CEO Dave Watson said that his company has deployed one million Xfinity Flex devices so far within its service footprint.
Flex, which Comcast offers to its broadband-only subscribers, combines a streaming device and a unified platform for free content and third-party streaming services including Netflix and Hulu. The company launched the service in March last year and in September, it made the service free for its broadband subscribers.
Comcast ended the first quarter of 2020 with approximately 26.9 million residential broadband subscribers.
Watson said Comcast is mostly focused on growing monthly active users for Flex and said that figure will always lag behind the amount of deployed devices.
“We’ll give you more over time on that and that will be the main thing we focus on. But we’re really pleased,” said Watson during a MoffettNathanson investor event.
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For Comcast, Flex is primarily a broadband product and is designed to help mitigate broadband customer churn while also boosting net additions. Besides its streaming video features, Flex also supports security and other connected home functions. The device is based on the Xfinity X1 platform and it comes with a voice remote and user interface designed by Comcast.
Besides potential churn-lowering benefits, Watson said that there is a longer-term monetization opportunity with Flex through advanced advertising and participation in app revenue.
Flex factors into Comcast’s efforts around improving self-install procedures for its customers. Watson said the company was already at over 50% across all product lines for self-installs before COVID-19, and he said now the company is getting close to 100% self-install.