Walmart In Talks To Buy Vizio For More Than $2 Billion (investing.com) 31
According to the Wall Street Journal, Walmart is in talks to buy TV manufacturer Vizio for more than $2 billion. Shares of Vizio jumped 36% after the report, while Walmart's shares were down about 1%. From the report: Walmart, including its Sam's Club chain, has historically been Vizio's largest customer. Vizio is historically the largest television brand sold at Walmart by sales. The deal talks demonstrate the importance of consumer data and ad space for major retailers as they build out their ad businesses and compete with Amazon. In addition to being an e-commerce behemoth, Amazon is among the biggest ad players in the U.S. behind Google parent Alphabet and Facebook owner Meta Platforms. Amazon has also been building its own smart TV business. Developing...
Gotta love the reasoning (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not about owning a major tv manufacturer so you get more profits. Nope, it's a gateway to shoving more ads down people's throats so you get more profits.
Every day brings us one step closer to Futurama [youtube.com].
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My first thought was of of IOI's proposed "Pure O2" advertising system in Ready Player One. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpPE85Jogjw)
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Why do we need so many ads? There's a whole ad industry, with agencies, production companies, and giants like Google that have a market cap like 4x the size of Walmart. All built on ads. I can't even understand how the companies that make and sell real pro
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That's the saddest part. I read the title of this story thinking "Weird, Walmart becomes a TV manufacturer... I get it'll be lower price for them, but at the size of Walmart they could also be in the food business, cleaning products, clothing, whatever".
Walmart already is in all of those businesses, including televisions. The Onn. brand of TVs is made by Walmart. They have the Sam's choice, Great Value, and Marketside food brands, etc.
List of Walmart house brands [wikipedia.org]
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Many (if not most or even all) of those are not actually made by Walmart, they're made by other companies under contract (like most "store brands" at grocery stores and such). There's a big difference in paying someone else to slap your label on the box and actually manufacturing the contents.
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Many (if not most or even all) of those are not actually made by Walmart, they're made by other companies under contract (like most "store brands" at grocery stores and such). There's a big difference in paying someone else to slap your label on the box and actually manufacturing the contents.
That's true, I suppose, but depending on where you draw the line, you could argue that Vizio doesn't make their own stuff, either. It's a U.S. company, but their products are made in factories in Mexico, China, and Vietnam by... I think maybe Foxconn.
Vizio presumably does the actual electrical engineering for their hardware, whereas Walmart may or may not to that for their Onn. brand. (I don't know.)
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Yeah, I think there's a pretty big difference between paying somebody to put your brand name on a product they create and produce and designing something and contracting out manufacturing. I don't _think_ the Onn/Durabrand stuff is actually designed and managed under a Walmart-owned company, they just go to Funai or whoever and say "we want a line of 4K TVs that we can retail for $299" (and next year they may pick a different supplier). Support and warranty handling is independent of Walmart; Vizio may cont
Onn (Score:2)
Oddly enough, Onn is the only brand, other than apple, that I've found to consistently produce reliable cables. (OK, I've never tried the ones that are *more* expensive than apple! And both apple and Onn don't react well to a a heavy device falling a couple of feet cable first, although both sacrifice themselves for the device.)
Not that I'd ever repeat the mistake of buying a Walmart television. I expect products to last more than four days . . .
hawk
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Why do we need so many ads?
There's a lot of value in knowing what people are watching, and for how long. These TVs can figure out what's playing, even when it's from an unknown source via HDMI.
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These TVs can figure out what's playing, even when it's from an unknown source via HDMI..
not without a network connection. my 65" panel is used exclusively as a monitor for my pc.
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I don't dispute that knowing what people are watching, for how long, and other information that builds a profile for a person helps you target them better. But at the end of the day... target with ads, right (arguably if you know enough you can also target them for phishing, or know when they're not home for burglary, but... that's different)? I've worked with a digital app team whose boss always touted the value of data. Ok, what are you
Cheap Junk (Score:1)
Vizio TVs are so cheap because they use screens that are 1-3 years old. They're selling you last years model put inside a new case and sold as this years model. They might be fine if you want a TV in the garage but I'd spend a bit more and get a full-featured TV without the ads and other bullshit, that utilizes the latest in screen tech and will last much longer.
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Not sure how "Customers of cheap shit" fit into it, but the whole thing's probably not for their benefit.
Re:Cheap Junk (Score:4, Insightful)
Walmart shoppers tend to be lower income so these cheap electronics allow them to get a TV they wouldn't be able to afford elsewhere, even if it isn't as nice as other options.
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Buy cheap, pay twice.
I've saved a lot of money over the years by doing basic research and getting good stuff. Walmart shoppers aren't just lower income, they are window shoppers.
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Not everyone needs the latest features. I still don't have 4K displays. I finally went to HD 1080 almost a decade ago from 4:3 CRT and LCD screens. :P
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Last year's screens are good enough for me. For that matter, my TVs are several years old. One is just a 1K TV, the other is 4K, my computer monitor is a 42" Vizio 4K TV, and has done the job extremely well for several years. I bought it for $250.
Sometimes, cheap is "good enough."
Howabout "No" (Score:5, Informative)
The deal talks demonstrate the importance of consumer data and ad space for major retailers
As if we needed another reason to not buy a Visio TV. [theverge.com]
And before you start with the "it's your fault for connecting it to your WiFi" schtick: They force you to do it in order to do anything more "advanced" than turn it on and change the input/channel. Don't like the color temp? Install the app. Brightness/Contrast? App. Seriously, the only buttons on the remote are Power, Input, Channel up, Channel down, Volume up, Volume down. Anything else? Install the app, and connect your TV to your WiFi. The only way to avoid them sucking up your data is to a) deal with your TV in it's "stock" condition. b) set up your network in such a way that once connected to the WiFi it can't phone home. And I would suspect that both of those options will be null and void once they put a 5g modem in the thing.
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Almost every TV has an On-Screen setup menu for adjusting those things via the remote.
Almost. Except the one sitting in my living room.
Huh? (Score:1)
I thought Vizio was just the Best Buy branding for their TV sets. So, Vizio is not some subsidiary of Best Buy? I don't recall seeing Vizio branded anything outside of Best Buy.
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You thought wrong. I have seen Vizio TVs at Costco, although not in a while.
https://www.vizio.com/en/official-retailers
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My first LCD TV was a 30" Vizio, purchased at Costco the better part of 20 years ago. At the time, it was a relatively inexpensive HD TV from a company nobody had heard of, but it worked like a champ for me...until some asshole broke into my condo and stole it. :-P
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Yep, Insignia was probably what I was confusing them with. Still not sure I've seen Vizio outside of Best Buy though, but then it's not like I go shopping for a new TV often.
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Dynex as well.
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I've bought Vizio at Target.
Vizio not a brand that I buy.... (Score:2)