In February of this year, Walmart confirmed plans to acquire Vizio in a $2.3 billion deal. Following a federally regulated waiting period, Walmart today confirmed the acquisition is finally complete, making the retail giant the official owner of the TV maker.
With the deal also including Vizio’s SmartCast operating system and platform, the move is expected to greatly increase Walmart’s position in both the smart TV and operating system markets.
“Since the inception of Vizio, our mission has been to provide incredible value, great technology, and award-winning innovation,” said William Wang, CEO and founder of Vizio. “Today, with the tremendous number of resources from Walmart, we will continue to further accelerate that mission around the best home entertainment experience.”
The purchase is also expected to open up new opportunities for the company’s Walmart Connect retail media business. What exactly this means for the end user remains unclear right now, but Walmart has suggested that the SmartCast platform will allow it “to serve its customers in new ways to enhance their shopping journeys.”
Vizio also has its own in-house ‘Vizio Ads’ business and it can be expected that Vizio Ads and Walmart Connect will begin to work more closely together in the future.
“Vizio offers great products at great prices that customers love. They’ve always put customers at the center of their business – and that’s core to Walmart’s values and the omnichannel experiences we’re excited to roll out,” said Seth Dallaire, executive vice president and chief growth officer, Walmart U.S. “Vizio has also expertly changed their business over time, like building and quickly scaling a profitable advertising business. Pairing it with Walmart Connect will be impactful and allow us to invest in our business even further on behalf of our customers.”
At the last count (end of Q3 2024) Vizio had 19.1 million SmartCast Active Accounts. Vizio not only saw a slight increase in the number of accounts during the most recent quarter, but also the number of hours streamed on its SmartCast platform.
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