William Wang likes being disruptive, and television shoppers are paying the price -- a lower price.
In 2002, when plasma TVs were selling for $10,000, the Taiwanese-born entrepreneur set out to sell one for $2,999. He fulfilled his ambition a year later, shipping a 46-inch model with a $2,799 price tag, about half what other brands then charged.
Now his Irvine-based company, Vizio Inc., is the No. 1 maker of flat-panel TVs in North America, outselling entrenched Asian competitors in the second quarter. The private company says that it is profitable, that it recorded nearly $700 million in revenue in 2006 and that it is on track for $2 billion in sales this year.
"They supplanted all the heavy hitters, including Sony and Samsung," said Edward Taylor, an analyst with the DisplaySearch research firm. "That's an incredible accomplishment."
Wang used a recipe similar to the one that catapulted Dell Inc. to the top of the personal computer heap two decades ago. Vizio sells TVs for temptingly low prices by slashing expenses, minimizing inventory, bypassing traditional retailers and aggressively managing suppliers.
Perhaps the biggest boost along the way came from Costco Wholesale Corp., which in 2004 gave the tiny manufacturer instant access to millions of generally higher-income shoppers.
"They are the most aggressive and fastest-growing TV maker in the market," said Van Baker, an analyst for research group Gartner Inc. "They operate on razor-thin margins and they keep overhead to a minimum. They have very low inventory and they turn their inventory over very fast. They're what Dell used to be."
A graduate of USC's electrical engineering program, Wang, 43, cut his teeth in the computer display business with Santa Ana-based Mag Innovision Inc., selling monitors that giant computer makers such as Gateway Inc. bought and resold under their own brand names.
But he had bigger ambitions. With his Asian manufacturer contacts, Wang believed that he could assemble a high-end plasma TV at a fraction of the standard price.
He took his idea to Gateway founder Ted Waitt, who was then the company's chief executive. Waitt was just embarking on a new strategy: selling higher-margin consumer electronics in an effort to bring the struggling company back to profitability. He hired Wang, and in December 2002 Gateway shipped its first television.
Gateway eventually bailed out of consumer electronics to focus on PCs. Wang decided to do it himself.
