I'm going to have Anjali Sud, who is the CEO of Tubi, come and join me. And please, everyone, give a warm welcome to Anjali. This is not Anjali and my first rodeo. We did this when you were the CEO of Vimeo.
Yes, and I keep coming back.
Love that. Thank you. I like Vimeo a lot, but I've got to say this is going to be a much more fun conversation. We're not talking B2B tech. We're talking Super Bowl. So, Tubi made huge news this year when you were the first platform to put the entire Super Bowl on streaming for free, and that drove a record number of streaming viewers. Congratulations. What were your learnings from that that you would share with the world, but also just other networks who are trying to navigate how they balance the linear versus streaming Super Bowl conundrum?
Yeah. So, I mean, you heard Karik talk a little bit about this, but for sure, learning number one is when you can offer live sporting events that are also cultural moments, when you can offer them for free and you can intentionally try and drive young, you know, female-forward, multicultural audiences, it works. It expands the pie. And that's what we saw. We had 24 million viewers on Tubi on game day. 40% were between the ages of 18 to 34. We indexed younger, more female, more diverse. And it was great. It's great for the league. It's great for fans. And I think you'll see more of us do more of that, and hopefully you'll see more of that in general. I think the thing that we also learned, though, is you do have to meet audiences where they are. And one of the ways that we engaged with those fans, you know, we marketed via digital influencers. We had like TikTok stars telling, you know, their friends about the game. We had a red carpet before the game with Olivia Culpo talking about the fashion. We had a live interactive shopping experience. And we had brands like beauty brands like e.l.f. Beauty advertising there. So I do think you have to know your audience. You have to focus on serving them well, but you can expand the pie. And then I think there was another topic that Karthik brought up around discoverability. It is a challenge. And I'd say another thing that we learned was we did partner with all of, you know, the Rokus, Amazons, LGs, Vizios of the world to just make it super easy for Americans when they turned on their television that day. It was very clear and easy to find where you can watch the game for free. And that took a lot of, I think, industry partnership. And I think that made a really big difference. So these are all things that, you know, hopefully we'll just be doing more of.
So on the industry partnership side, obviously a rising tide lifts all boats because everyone benefits if they are getting more attention, whether you're the TV operating system or you're the free TV app. But for some of these events that might not be as big as the Super Bowl, and I'd want to get your opinion on which you're going to explore, do you think those types of partnerships will be as easy?
I think they will because we've hopefully demonstrated the value here. But I'll tell you, it is on platforms like Tubi to keep extending that and learning. And I'll give you an example. One thing we know about Gen Z audiences is they care as much sometimes about the athletes and the stories behind the athletes, what we call shoulder content and programming, as they do the live event. And so one of the things Tubi will look to do to sort of make this a compelling proposition for our partners and for the fans is invest more in shoulder content. We just announced, speaking of tennis, a Naomi Osaka doc that's going to be coming out on Tubi in August. It's going to be talking about her journey coming back into the game after having a baby. We are doing a docuseries with Cam Ward, the number one NFL draft pick. We're going to be doing World Cup programming following some of the footballers. And I think it's just recognizing that beyond the diehard sports fans, there are people who are in it for the culture, and we need to serve them with compelling stories and content and build that momentum. And so I'm quite optimistic, actually, that this is not a one-off. It's the beginning of a needed sea change.
But that's fascinating because you're not necessarily talking about bringing more live rights to the platform. It's about building the shoulder content around the live programming, even if that live programming is somewhere else, because you can tap into the ongoing fandom.
Yeah. I mean, I think for us, some of it is being, it's a marketing vehicle, right? It's expanding the audience, and obviously if we can have the live rights to stream something, we certainly will. But there are times when we won't, and that's okay. Because again, it's more about showing those non-diehard sports fans that there's something in this that's exciting. And I do think across different kinds of sports we're seeing this, and it is real. I think for women in sports in particular, there's just a need here. There's a vacuum that I think, you know, we have an opportunity to fill.
So then on the live rights, you know, obviously the Super Bowl was a unique situation because you're owned by Fox. Fox Corp had the rights, so you're partnering with them. Is there ever a world that you think where Tubi will go after its own live rights outside of what Fox has?
