holdings ltd type public company traded as hkse 0303 industry electronics industry founded october 1976 ; 40 years ago 1976 10 headquarters hong kong area served worldwide products residential phones educational toys electronic manufacturing services small to medium sized business phones hotel phones cordless headsets integrated access device baby monitor 1 revenue us 1 898.9 million fy2014 net income us 203.3 million fy2014 number of employees around 30 000 website www.vtech.com vtech traditional chinese is a hong kong based global supplier of electronic learning products from infancy to preschool and the world s largest manufacturer of cordless phones . 2 3 4 it is also one of the top 50 electronic manufacturing services providers globally . 5 in november 2015 vtech s learning products app store learning lodge was compromised leading to the exposure of names addresses encrypted passwords and personal information of its customers including photos and chat logs . 6 contents 1 name and listing 2 history 2.1 2015 data breach 3 core businesses 3.1 electronic learning products elps 3.2 telecommunication tel products 3.3 contract manufacturing services cms 4 reception 5 references 6 external links name and listing edit the company was originally named video technology limited in reference to the company s first product a home video game console . 7 in 1991 it was renamed vtech holdings limited to reflect a wider portfolio of products . 8 the company first listed in hong kong in june 1986 under the name video technology international holdings limited . it was privatised and delisted from the stock exchange of hong kong limited in 1990 . 9 vtech obtained a primary listing on the london stock exchange in 1991 . in 1992 the company relisted on the stock exchange of hong kong limited 10 establishing a dual primary listing with london . in 1993 the company established its american depositary receipt programme . vtech delisted voluntarily from the london stock exchange on 7 october 2008 . 11 it also terminated its american depositary receipt programme with effect from 21 january 2011 . history edit vtech has developed edutainment consoles since 1988 their first being the socrates . vtech was founded in hong kong in october 1976 by two local entrepreneurs allan wong 12 13 and stephen leung . 8 when the first single chip microprocessor intel 4004 became available in the early 1970s the company saw the potential it offered for portable consumer electronics products . wong & leung set up a small factory in to kwa wan with a us 40 000 investment and a staff of 40 people . in the first year turnover was less than us 1 million . 8 vtech initially focused on developing video games . in 1977 the company created its first home tv game console a version of pong . since only consumers in north america and europe could afford such items the company targeted primarily these markets . the united kingdom was chosen as the first market for pong as hong kong and the uk used the same standard for television systems . in 1978 the founders introduced led games they had developed to buyers from radioshack in the us which were sold under the radioshack brand . vtech then began to build its own brand . vtech unveiled its first electronic learning product elp called lesson one at the new york toy fair in february 1980 . 8 it taught children basic spelling and maths . an exclusive version under the name computron was offered to sears with the product being prominently advertised by sears in its catalogue which was a popular shopping guide . 14 15 laser computer next vtech made the video game console creativision . vtech then branched out into personal computers including a series of ibm compatible pcs beginning in 1983 and apple ii compatible computers beginning in 1985 including a model called laser 128 . vtech exited the personal computer market in 1997 due to keen competition . 16 in 1985 the united states federal communications commission fcc allocated the frequency band 900mhz to ism industrial scientific and medical devices . taking advantage of this vtech started developing a cordless telephone using the 900 mhz band and in 1991 introduced the world s first fully digital 900 mhz cordless telephone . 17 18 in 2000 to expand its cordless phone business vtech acquired the consumer telephone business of lucent technologies . the acquisition also gave vtech the exclusive right for 10 years to use the at & t brand in conjunction with the manufacture and sale of wireline telephones and accessories in the united states and canada . 19 although the acquisition increased sales of vtech s telecommunication products by 50 % it led to operating losses and write offs . the company issued a profit warning in march 2001 and launched a broad restructuring plan . 20 by the financial year 2002 the company had turned around the business and returned to profitability . 21 today vtech s core businesses remain cordless telephones and electronic learning products . its contract manufacturing services which manufactures a range of electronic products on behalf of medium sized companies has also become a major source of revenue . the company has diversified geographically selling to north america europe asia latin america the middle east and africa . 22 2015 data breach edit this section needs to be updated . please update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information . july 2016 in november of 2015 lorenzo bicchierai writing for vice magazine s motherboard reported that vtech s servers had been compromised and the corporation was victim to a data breach which exposed personal data belonging to millions of individuals including children who signed up for or utilized services provided by the company related to several products it manufactures . bicchierai was contacted by the unnamed attacker in late november during the week before thanksgiving at which point the unnamed individual disclosed information about the security vulnerabilities with the journalist and detailed the breach . 23 bicchierai then reached out to information security researcher troy hunt to examine data provided by the attacker to bicchierai and to confirm if the leak was indeed authentic and not an internet hoax . hunt examined the information and confirmed it appeared to be authentic . hunt then dissected the data in detail and published the findings on his website . according to hunt vtech s servers failed to utilize basic ssl encryption to secure the personal data in transit from the devices to vtech s servers ; that vtech stored customer information in unencrypted plaintext failed to securely hash or salt passwords . 24 the attack leveraged an sql injection to gain privileged root access to vtech servers . once privileged access was acquired the attacker exfiltrated the data including some 190 gigabytes of photographs of children and adults detailed chat logs between parents and children which spanned over the course of years and voice recordings all unencrypted and stored in plain text . the attacker shared some 3 832 image files with the journalist for verification purposes and some redacted photographs were published by the journalist . commenting on the leak the unnamed attacker expressed their disgust with being able to so easily obtain access to such a large trove of data saying frankly it makes me sick that i was able to get all this stuff . vtech should have the book thrown at them and explained their rationale for going to the press was because they felt vtech would have ignored their reports and concerns . 25 26 vtech corporate security was unaware their systems had been compromised and the breach was first brought to their attention after being contacted by bicchierai prior to publication of the article . upon notification the company took a dozen or so websites and services offline . 23 25 in an faq published by the company they explain some 4 854 209 accounts belonging to parents and 6 368 509 profiles belonging to children had been compromised . the company further claims the passwords had been encrypted which is contrary to reports by the independent security researcher contacted by vice . the company indicated they were working with unspecified local authorities . 27 24 vtech subsequently brought in the information security services company fireeye to manage incident response and audit the security of their platform going forward . 28 mark nunnikhoven of trend micro criticized the company s handling of the incident and called their faq wishy washy corporate speak . 29 united states senators edward markey and joe barton co founders of the bi partisan congressional privacy caucus issued an open letter to the company inquiring as to why and what kind of information belonging to children is stored by vtech and how they use this data security practices employed to protect that data if children s information is shared or sold to third parties and how the company complies with the children s online privacy protection act . 30 in february 2016 hunt publicized the fact that vtech had modified its terms and conditions for new customers so that the customer acknowledges and agrees that any information transmitted to vtech may be intercepted or later acquired by unauthorized parties . 31 32 core businesses edit electronic learning products elps edit vtech was among the pioneers of the elp industry beginning in 1980 with a unit designed to teach children basic spelling and mathematics . 33 today vtech is a leading global supplier of elps from infancy to preschool 2 3 4 making both individual standalone products and platform products that combine a variety of consoles with different software . 12 its v.smile tv learning system which was launched in 2004 established what the company calls platform products as an important category within its elps . 34 latest additions to the platform product range are innotab max 35 36 kidizoom smart watch 37 and innotv . 38 39 telecommunication tel products edit vtech introduced the world s first 900 mhz and 5.8 ghz cordless phones in 1991 and 2002 respectively . according to mza ltd 40 the company is the world s largest manufacturer of cordless telephones . in north america vtech is the largest player in the industry according to marketwise consumer insights llc 41 selling both at & t and vtech branded phones and accessories . outside north america vtech mainly supplies products to fixed line telephone operators brand names and distributors on an original design manufacturing odm basis . contract manufacturing services cms edit vtech started manufacturing products for other brand names on an original equipment manufacturing oem basis in the 1980s and cms became one of the company s core businesses in the early 2000s . vtech has been identified as one of the world s top 50 electronics manufacturing services providers 5 providing electronics manufacturing services for medium sized companies . vtech s cms has focused on four main product categories professional audio equipment switching mode power supplies wireless products and solid state lighting . 42 reception edit a june 2012 report from the institute for global labour and human rights 43 said the working conditions in the vtech factories in china failed to meet the legal standards and could be described as sweatshops . vtech strongly rejected the allegations and issued a statement on 22 june 2012 reiterating that it is a responsible and caring employer which abides by the legal requirements relating to employment in all jurisdictions where it operates . 44 references edit baby monitor a b hong kong s 40 richest . forbes . 5 january 2012 . a b vtech joins fray with tablets for children . south china morning post . 12 february 2011 . a b company research vtech holdings pdf . maybank kim eng . 24 march 2014 . p. 7 . a b the mmi top 50 for 2014 . manufacturing market insider . children