In an SEC filing this past Monday, Soyo Group Inc., the maker of Soyo and Honeywell branded HDTVs (Link) announced that it has sought Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection. The company has ceased all operations and its CFO has resigned according to the notice.
Attempts to contact Soyo by phone were unsuccessful. Honeywell Corp. has yet to respond to an inquiry as to its future HDTV plans or its willingness to cover the Soyo/Honeywell 5 year warranty. Soyo sold most of its Honeywell HDTVs through Home Shopping Network. Below is a copy of the SEC 8-K filing.
On April 30, 2009, Vasquez & Company LLP (“Vasquez”) resigned as the Company’s auditors. Vasquez did not issue an audit report for the year ended 2008. During the audit for the year ended 2008, Vasquez had a disagreement or difference of opinion with employees and senior management of the Company because they significantly expanded the scope of their audit for further investigation going as far back as the year ended 2007 and interim quarterly periods ended in 2007.
In addition, Vasquez advised the Company that “our audit report for the year ended 2007 and our pre-issuance review procedures for the interim quarterly periods ended in 2007 and interim quarterly periods ended in 2008 should no longer be relied upon.”
On May 5, 2008, the Company discontinued all operations and filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection. The petition was filed in the United States Bankruptcy Court, Central District of California,  Riverside Division,  Case number 09-19355-RN. A Chapter 7 trustee has been appointed by the Bankruptcy Court to administer the Company’s assets and liabilities.
The Company has defaulted on all loans owed to creditors, including loans in the approximate outstanding balances of $24,000,000 and $1,500,000 owed to United Commercial Bank, the Company’s primary creditor. The Company has not paid interest or principal on the loans since March of 2009. Pursuant to the Company’s stipulation to the application of UCB in the Superior Court, San Bernardino County, Case number KC055623, Kenneth Krasne has been appointed as receiver for those assets of the Company that constitute collateral for its loan from UCB, which collateral includes almost all of the Company’s accounts receivables and inventory, and equipment.
On May 10, 2009, the Company accepted the resignation of Nancy Chu as the Company’s Chief Financial Officer and a member of the Board of Directors.
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Wow,I’m lucky my Honeywell TV worked OK for a year, but now acting strange! Just discovered Soyo bankruptcy. Doesn’t Honeywell have any responsibility or support?
Several years ago I bought a 32″ Soyo HDTV from Shop at Home TV (who have gone out of business).
I had a host of issues with this TV and Soyo was not giving me any help with my warranty since Shop at Home had gone out of business. Finally my states (CT) Attourney General got Soyo to send me a replacement TV. Soyo even gave me a 37″ HDTV instead of a 32″. I liked what the 32″ was advertised to offer in features but it didn’t. The 37″ TV was good for over a year but now has serious issues and Soyo is out of business. I guess I should have known that if it seems to good to be true it probably is!
It seems as though there were a lot of people ripped off by SOYO!
I too was suckered into buying the Soyo Honeywell Arius 22″ monitor. It did work flawlessly for 1.5 years, but now it’s toast. Just like the poster above, my monitor will show me a brief glimpse of image, then just goes to a black screen.
What a complete disappointment!! I also bought this monitor because of the warranty and previous positive dealings with J&R. Now I am looking at a paperweight. I’ll try to get something out of J&R, but based on what I’ve read elsewhere it’s not looking good.
BEWARE of J&R!!! They’ll happily take your money, but then they’ll happily screw you too.
Bought a 22 inch Soyo Honeywell Arius in Nov 08. Took it out of the box March 09. Worked fine until a month or so ago when the screen started going black without ever recovering for more than a split second or two after coming out of standby mode or after an automatic restart of the PC or after turning the monitor on and off to try to get the damned screen to stay up. My two-faced megastore vendor J&R Music World said they “wouldn’t leave me hanging” and began talking about giving me a comparable monitor to replace it. But in the final inning, after 10 days of leaving me in the dark, the liars said that the best they would do is sell me another brand at cost. They wouldn’t even offer to repair it. They said Honeywell is responsible for repairs and solutions for 7 years post Soyo bankruptcy. They said all of us should go to Honeywell for SOLUTIONS. I say STAY AWAY FROM J&R MUSIC WORLD (sheister liars) and STAY AWAY FROM HONEYHELL. Megastores are in the business of buying distressed goods from distressed companies while keeping the public in the dark. I am sure the sheisters at J&R knew Soyo was in trouble and bought their junk at a secret cost far below any “at cost” price they might show to the public. Impose criminal penalties on corporate officers who injure the public while hiding the financial realities of their businesses from the public and relevant state and federal authorities. Deny such duplicitous scoundrels the protection of corporate bankruptcy. Let them pay out of their own pockets for the replacement or repair of the crap they sold. DIE MEGASTORES DIE!
I have a Prive lcd tv made by soyo and they won,t honour the warranties and live in canada can anyone help me get my problem solved??????
I have a soyo tv and for the most part it is ok but the remote quit and I cannot get the code given to work it with a universal remote. I was going to contact the company but from the sounds of this I will not likely have any luck? Any suggestions?
I bought a 42″ Honeywell (soyo licensed the name) LCD tv off HSN in Feb ’09. I have never had a problem with it, for the most part its a good tv.
I use it to play all my videos games as well as watching tv and HD movies. I would buy another one, but I guess not anymore unless some place is going to clearance the remaining inventory.
I worked for SOYO back in the mid 00s and resigned after a short time working there. I knew about SOYO because of their good PC Motherboards back in the days. I was quite disappointed to learn about their new low quality products and their lack of human touch that I felt I was working in a concentration camp.
I guess they were already under heavy economic pressure.
The most important thing is to make your products and services grow in quality, innovation, durability, reliability, value, etc. instead of growing in size.
We all should learn to make a better use of the earths resources by not making junk. If the world could only learn from Japan.
Soyo used to make some pretty good motherboards back in the day, before getting out of the market. They switched over to monitors and TVs around 2004. It’s such a shame that a company that once made halfway decent motherboards went out with a fizzle (literally), leaving consumers high and dry with junk HDTVs.
This is much like the story of ABIT, who made some of the greatest motherboards back around the turn of the century. I think they went out of business while making photo picture frames or something stupid like that. Lesson learned, keep making motherboards, don’t switch over to LCDs when times get tough.
Hello Folks, I am sure, like myself, you must be dissapointed in your purchase of Soyo groups product(s). Lesson learned -> These new and cheap brands are not the best; should stick with Pioneer, Sanyo, Hitachi or Sony!
Anyways, here is a contact number for you. Patricia Zimmerman is the acting trustee for Soyo Group and can be reached @ 951-244-8544. The case number you can reference is 09-193-55-RN.
All the best.
For those who end up having issues with SOYO not returning your goods should contact the entities mentioned in the second to last paragraph. It is often the case that your assets get mixed into theirs and they cannot claim items you have purchased. This doesn’t mean they have accrued any of soyo’s liabilities though, meaning that they do not have to honor the warranty… yet they may not have anyway to track their assets (not common in this case as well) and may send you a perfectly good tv to settle the problem :D
Another thing to look at is who buys out SOYO as a company, as they will most likely accrue the liabilities (your warranty) as well.
I’m pretty sure it was May 5, 2009 when they declared bankruptcy.
I purchased a monitor from Buy.com that was Dead On Arrival. I followed the instructions in the box, and contacted the manufacturer, Soyo. At first they tried to claim the warranty wasn’t valid. Then they claimed that I had to ship it to them at my expense. Finally, they gave me an RMA# and sent me a shipping label. I shipped it to them. The tracking information shows they received it on May 4. Buy.com is refusing to refund my money too. Now, I’m out the $180, and I don’t even have the DOA monitor anymore.
I bought a 32 inch soyo a couple years ago and these TVs are plagued with problems, highly sub standard and don’t last very long, ghosting, black bars, persistent screen burn in. running anything in 4:3 for even short periods of time literally ruins the TV for good by leaving bleeding black lines that never go away. I contacted the HSN it was bought from, and they are sending me a box to ship it in for a fix/replacement (no cost to me). however after reading this and the comments I am weary of sending it in; it wouldn’t be fun to send it to them only to wait forever to get it back with no fix/replacement, and even worse, if it comes back even more broken or doesn’t come back at all. The TV is still under warranty. There was also extra money paid for the warranty, so that’s an even lower blow as I paid probably 150% of what this TV costed. I’m gonna have to do some calling around to see if HSN will honor the warranty properly or not, because it didn’t seem like a problem over the phone talking to them. Even the cheapest HDTV’s of today are better than any SOYO, so I’d be happy with any replacement of the same size. If they do honor it and send me another soyo, I’m just going to try and sell it ASAP. If not, I’m gonna be pretty pissed.
I bought a monitor from Soyo and it stopped working after 6 months. I followed procesdures and returned the monitor at my cost and then never heard anything. I guess that will teach me to buy from a little known brand.
I purchased the Honeywell TV that was warrantied by SOYO. I spoke to Honeywell today and they said the warranty would not be replaced or covered by another company. I am very upset with this news, as the warranty was a HUGE selling point for us.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16889125001
newegg carries two different models.
yes i really would like toknow how it was able to file bankruptcy without notifying shareholder?
I have never seen a Honeywell-branded TV for sale; perhaps that has something to do with this venture’s failure. (It may have never gotten off the ground.)
How is it that the company was able to file for bankruptcy protection in May of 2008 (according to the originating forms of this document), yet continue to market its stock and avoid making any notification to shareholders until over a year later, without legal repercussions to its owners?
This sounds profoundly illegal.