Walmart just wrote another billion-dollar check to prove it’s dead serious about becoming an advertising company. The retailer announced its agreement to acquire Vibe.co, a self-serve connected TV advertising platform, in a deal valued between $1 billion and $1.4 billion.

This isn’t Walmart’s first move into connected TV. It acquired smart TV maker Vizio for roughly $2.3 billion in December 2024. But where Vizio gave Walmart the screens, Vibe.co gives it the software to fill those screens with ads from a much wider pool of advertisers.

What Vibe.co actually does

Vibe.co built a self-serve platform that essentially turns CTV ad buying into something closer to running a Facebook ad campaign. A local pizza chain or a DTC skincare brand can now buy ads on streaming services without needing a Madison Avenue agency on retainer.

The platform provides access to over 500 streaming channels and serves more than 10,000 advertisers. Founded around 2021-2022, Vibe.co grew fast enough to raise a $22.5 million Series A in early 2024, with later funding rounds bringing its total to approximately $50 million. Now it’s getting acquired for potentially 28 times that amount.

The company’s proprietary AI capabilities handle campaign activation and performance measurement, which Walmart plans to tie directly to commerce outcomes.

Walmart’s advertising empire takes shape

Walmart Connect, the company’s retail media arm, is the vehicle through which all of this comes together. Vizio gave Walmart a hardware footprint in millions of living rooms. Vibe.co gives Walmart the ad-tech plumbing to monetize that footprint at scale, particularly among the massive pool of SMBs that traditional TV has ignored.

Walmart knows what 240 million weekly customers buy, browse, and search for. Layer that shopper data on top of CTV ad targeting and you get something that traditional TV networks simply cannot offer: closed-loop measurement from ad impression to checkout.

The acquisition is expected to close by the end of Walmart’s fiscal 2027, pending regulatory approvals.

Why this matters beyond Walmart

Amazon has its Fire TV ecosystem and a massive advertising operation. Google has YouTube. Walmart is assembling its own stack: Vizio hardware, Vibe.co software, and first-party retail data.

Walmart’s grocery business might run at single-digit margins, but advertising revenue is dramatically more profitable. Spending a combined $3.5 billion or more on CTV acquisitions in roughly two years signals that Walmart views its ad business as a core strategic priority, not a side project.