VisionTek has folded, doors are closed!

[noko]

The largest supplier of Nvidia based cards in North America has folded.

<b><font color=blue>While VisionTek experienced some problems earlier this year with financial debt, it was thought that all was going well for this U.S. based company from Northern Illinois. We have come to find out this weekend that all is far from well at one of our fave VidCard builders. It seems as though VisionTek is in utter financial shambles and a trustee has been appointed to come in and liquidate all the assets of the company.

Bankruptcy no. Foreclosure yes. It is understood that the trustee is there in order to recoup as much money from the current VisionTek assets in order to pay back dept to the bank(s) with interest in this matter. So what is seems will happen is that VisionTek will simply cease to exist.

VisionTek was currently in motion to move it’s manufacturing to either China or Taiwan in order to cut costs associated with its products. VisionTek has also been currently diversifying their product lines to include non-VidCard related items. All seemed to be looking up for VisionTek. While this information does come from a very credible source even the information they had was a bit slim, but it was not ruled out that improper business practices was something that put the last nail in the coffin.

With VisionTek simply vanishing, this leaves a huge gap for NVIDIA to fill. VisionTek was the number one retailer of NVIDIA based VidCards in North America. Hercules has moved to ATi products, Creative is gone for NVIDIA as well with the purchase of 3dLabs, and Elsa's (which is now bankrupt) top-end VidCards were built by VisionTek anyway.

PNY is still here in the USA, but I simply think they lack the production capabilities or market savvy to deliver for NVIDIA even though they already have penetration into the larger retail channels. The smaller guys like Gainward, eVGA, MSI, Leadtek, and even possibly such companies as Prolink, ABIT, or Inno3D have a shot to help get cards to market for NVIDIA. It will be very interesting to see how this plays out, but it would seem that PNY would be best positioned to immediately take the NVIDIA North American Sales Crown.

One thing is for sure; this could not come at a worse time for NVIDIA. They are desperately trying to get their NV28 and NV30 chipsets to market before the Christmas buying season ends and they have just lost their biggest card builder that pumps their chipsets into the retail channels in North America. We have heard that NVIDIA has been doing everything it can to keep VisionTek afloat and that would make perfect sense.

ATi will start shipping its Radeon 9700 Pro card on Monday and we have some reports that they started shipping late last week. ATi already has tremendous shelf space with the major US retailers and this is going to do nothing but give them more room to work with. ATi was already poised to take a significant amount of market share from NVIDIA and this VisionTek development is certainly something that will weigh in on that even more.

Thanks to all the guys at VisionTek that have supported us over the last year and thanks to VisionTek for bringing a great product to market. Now that VisionTek is gone, to whom is NVIDIA going to turn.
<A HREF="http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MzM5" target="_new">HardOCP</A></b></font color=blue>

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by noko on 08/18/02 08:23 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[chuck232]

Looks bad, especially with nVidia not exactly in the bestest of positions. What'll they do now??...

<i>Past mistakes may make you look stupid, but avoiding future ones will make you look smart!</i>

 

[phsstpok]

Switching to a retail operation was probably too much for Visiontek. As an OEM only company they were a premier supplier. Marketing product must have been much simpler then.

<b>I have so many cookies I now have a FAT problem!</b>

 

[flamethrower205]

Maybe they goto leadtek?

My frog asked me for a straw...dunno what happened his ass all over the place

 

[eden]

Seems pretty glum, but IMO that'll teach them not to jack up Canadian pricing. Everywhere I go, VisionTek cards are so high, a GF4 MX460 is 229$ in most places, the MX420, god of the cheap is 169$. MSI has the reign of best prices in town.
So VisionTek needs to rethink their Canadian pricing and make sure they are not jacked up, then they might've been more lucky this quarter and the past one.

--
Is the opportunity to earn money by working, free?

 

[chuck232]

Yeah, I know what you mean, but someone told me about a V-Tek GF4 Ti4400 for $309 at aniteccom.com. That's a pretty good deal if you ask me...

<i>Past mistakes may make you look stupid, but avoiding future ones will make you look smart!</i>

 

[phsstpok]

Sounds pretty final to me. They're done.

I was wondering why there weren't any press releases any newer than June 18 at the Visiontek site. Too bad. Over the years they made some nice video cards. I owned/own a nice Geforce256 (very overclockable) and Geforce2 GTS-V (not so overclockable but very cheap). Geforce 3's and 4's (Ti's) were always out of my price range.

Seems like Visiontek was trying to expand it's markets and it's product line. Unfortunately, this was during an industry slowdown. Plus look at some of their products. The MX series are priced at the level of Radeon 8500OEMs, 8500LEs and now 9000s (the last was probably not a factor). The MXs can't compete with these cards. One of Visiontek's new products was a CDRW drive. Don't know who was making these for them but look at who Visiontek had to compete against, Liteon, Asus, LG, Benq, Cyberdrive, etc. All of whom have lowered their prices to outrageously low levels. How much profit margin could there be if Visiontek had to purchase and re-label drives to compete against these companies? (I'm assuming they were reselling and not manufacturing drives).

It's true, here in the USA, we are enjoying low prices for video cards. I wonder if Visiontek's demise will have a large effect on this.

<b>I have so many cookies I now have a FAT problem!</b>

 

[chuck232]

ACtually, could it be good, since many retailers'll be liquidating their V-Tek stock? One thing, the only GF4s Futureshop sells is the V-tek brand, what'll they do now? Only sell ATI cards??... This could be very good news for ATi.

<i>Past mistakes may make you look stupid, but avoiding future ones will make you look smart!</i>

 

[phsstpok]

We will probably start seeing formerly uncommon brands to North America, like InnoVision, Daytona, Jaton, Triplex, Pine, X-Micro, Albatron.

<b>I have so many cookies I now have a FAT problem!</b>

 

[chuck232]

IIRC, some of those companies aren't bad.. it's like the invasion of the Asian semi makers....

<i>Past mistakes may make you look stupid, but avoiding future ones will make you look smart!</i>

 

[eden]

Selling MSI would be the best thing for FutureShop. MSI's low MSRP ensures that even FutureCrap's money grabbing business can't jack so much. It's not like they can up the price by 100$ for MID END cards!

Also I recall distinctly, having seen PNY being sold at FutureShop, and yeah they are price gouging it too. For a Ti4600, I think it was 599$. Sad.

That's why I shop at RBC, knowledgeable staff that knows the limits to how far they can up prices, and their MSI video card prices have always been the best.

--
Is the opportunity to earn money by working, free?

 

[chuck232]

Ueah, but I find V-Tek cards to be of good quality. I got RBC to pricematch and I'll probably get a V-Tek Ti4400 for $309CDN!! W00T!!! :lol:

<i>Past mistakes may make you look stupid, but avoiding future ones will make you look smart!</i>

 

[eden]

Wow that's the general Ti4200 price!
Pretty good deal if RBC matches it, though I doubt it, considering they also sell price gouged VisionTeks. Really too sad they had to end like this, but I think they should've seen it coming, and they should've paid attention to the Canadian market as well.

--
Is the opportunity to earn money by working, free?

 

[rubikian]

What about the warranty on the cards sold earlier?

 

[chuck232]

Well, I guess the Canadian market isn't as large/important as we Canadians feel huh??

<i>Past mistakes may make you look stupid, but avoiding future ones will make you look smart!</i>

 

[chuck232]

No warranty anymore. :frown:

<i>Past mistakes may make you look stupid, but avoiding future ones will make you look smart!</i>

 

[Rig]

What does that mean for people with Visontek cards? I mean, what about new drivers? Does this mean you'll have to buy a new brand of card or can you get drivers elsewhere? Also, do you have to get a driver specifically written for your card when DX9 comes out? I'm a little unclear on this DirectX thing. Is there just one DX driver or is a DX-based driver needed specifically for your make and model of card?

My Rig is bigger than yours.

Huzzah for Antec, AMD, and ASUS!!!

 

[chuck232]

Well, all you'll be missing out on is the warranty, as the drivers you can get from nvidia.com. I think all nVidia cards use the same unified driver, so that's nothing to be worried about. And anyways, if you o/c, then your warranty is gone anyways, so not a concern to me .

<i>Past mistakes may make you look stupid, but avoiding future ones will make you look smart!</i>

 

[Jake75]

RIP

<font color=blue>*</font color=blue><font color=red>**</font color=red>
<font color=white>***</font color=white>
<font color=red>***</font color=red>

 

[noko]

RIP maybe not. At Techreport it has this to say about the late VisionTek

<b><font color=purple>Over the weekend the [H]ard|OCP reported on VisionTek's foreclosure. VisionTek's own John Malley has issued a statement in response that clarifies a few things:

<i>"An Assignee / Trustee as been appointed, and will attempt to maximize the value of the company's assets. His belief is that the assets have a higher value as a "turn-key" operation than in a liquidation. The Trustee is continuing to operate the company to determine if a sale is a viable alternative to a liquidation, and he is currently talking to interested parties. The company is continuing to take orders, ship products, and honor rebates."</i>

Even though VisionTek is still selling product, it's probably not a great idea to go out and buy one of their cards until the company's fate is determined.
So, who wants to buy VisionTek?

<A HREF="http://www.tech-report.com/" target="_new">TechReport</A>

</b></font color=purple>

Well, maybe a last ditch effort, maybe just to sell the remaining inventory, maybe to gain some pity money. I guess it is not on the tombstone yet the last date .