VIZIO Acquired By LeEco For $2 Billion

VIZIO is being acquired by LeEco, the companies have announced, a deal that costs $2 billion and will involve VIZIO, for the most part, operating as a LeEco subsidiary. Both VIZIO's hardware and software businesses are being acquired; while they'll operate as a subsidiary, the company's data business will be spun out into a separate private company, says LeEco. Both companies are benefiting from the acquisition, with VIZIO giving LeEco its massive user base in North America and LeEco, for its part, being poised to expand VIZIO across the globe.

UPDATE: LeEco will no longer be acquiring VIZIO as previously planned. On April 10th, 2017, LeEco cited "regulatory headwinds" as the reason for the deal falling through.

VIZIO is well known in North America for its televisions and audio products, ad is commonly found in retail stores across the nation. That won't be changing after the acquisition is finalized, as LeEco plans to keep it going as a wholly-owned subsidiary. LeEco isn't as well known in this part of the world, though, and it's hoping to change that with this acquisition.

Speaking about that goal, LeEco's CEO and Chairman YT Jia Founder said:

LeEco believes in breakthrough technologies, a complete ecosystem and disruptive pricing. Acquiring VIZIO is an important step in our globalization strategy and building our North American presence. From its inception, VIZIO introduced a disruptive business model that changed the industry and aligns with our vision of breaking boundaries to deliver consumer-focused products, software and services.

According to LeEco, VIZIO's executive management will stay put and continue running things under the subsidiary. Nothing about VIZIO's existing distribution channels will be changing, either. However, VIZIO's founder will be shifting positions to become the CEO and Chairman for Inscape, VIZIO's data business.

LeEco anticipates the acquisition will be closed by the end of this year.