Hisense Electric Co., Ltd, a publicly listed subsidiary of Hisense Group, has announced the purchase of Toshiba TV production, along with its research and development (R&D) service.
With a history that spans nearly 150 years, Toshiba is a leading display technology company in Japan ranking highly in its home market. Toshiba exited the North American flat panel display market back in 2015.
As part of the acquisition Hisense will purchase 95 percent stock shares of Toshiba Visual Solutions Corporation (TVS), a wholly owned subsidiary of Toshiba Corporation, for $114.2 million as of November 15, 2017 (12.9 billion Japanese Yen) with Toshiba retaining 5 percent stock holding. Hisense will obtain the TVS businesses that include production, research and development, and sales functions, as well as license to use the Toshiba brand for a period of 40 years for visual solution partners operating in Europe, South East Asia and other markets.
TVS primarily operates in TV and it provides a variety of ancillary products, including commercial and advertisement display products. The TVS purchase also secures two factories in Japan, employment for hundreds of Toshiba R&D employees, and a significant IP portfolio relating to TV technology business patents for image quality and acoustics.
Liu Hongxin, CEO of Hisense Group, points out that Hisense will optimize TVS' resources related to R&D, supply chain, global sales channels, and it will cooperate with and support each of those entities. Hongxin also says Hisense will provide competitive content operation services for smart TVs for the global market and aid in Toshiba's growth in Japanese market.
According to the IHS, sales of Toshiba TV ranked as the third largest brand in Japanese market in 2016 with the Hisense TV market share in Japan the highest among all non-Japanese brands. Collectively both brands cumulative market share reaches over 20 percent after the transaction. Hisense's TV business in 2016 ranked third in the world (IHS) and has held the number one market share position in China for 13 consecutive years.
As the Official Television Sponsor of the FIFA World Cup Russia 2018, Hisense says it will continue to expand and implement its global brand vision and strategy.
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