Walmart (NYSE: WMT) is one of the largest retailers in the world. It has achieved massive success with its large format box stores, Sam's Club stores, and its smaller grocery store locations. But that doesn't mean that everything it touches turns to gold. The company's recent $2.3 billion investment in Vizio is one endeavor that investors will want to monitor closely. Walmart has made big acquisitions before One of the most notable acquisitions that retailer Walmart has made in recent years was Jet.com. This roughly $3.3 billion deal goes back to 2016 when Walmart was looking to compete online with Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN). While the Jet.com deal was less than a decade ago, it seems like a totally different time. Image source: Getty Images. Back then, Walmart's online presence wasn't particularly impressive, and Amazon was still in the early days of its growth. According to Walmart: The acquisition will build on and complement the significant foundation already in place to serve customers across the Walmart app, site, and stores and position the company for even faster e-commerce growth in the future by expanding customer reach and adding new capabilities. That's a bit of cheerleading, which is to be expected of a corporate event news release. The key sentence from that news release, however, was this: "Walmart and Jet will maintain distinct brands, with Walmart.com focusing on delivering the company's Everyday Low Price strategy, while Jet will continue to provide a unique and differentiated customer experience with curated assortment." In 2020, just four years after buying Jet.com, Walmart closed the Jet.com website. Management extolled the benefits of the deal, which supposedly helped Walmart up its online retail game. But, in the end, Jet.com really wasn't an investment win for Walmart. Walmart buys Vizio for advertising technology This brings the story to Vizio, which makes electronics and, more recently, has created a software platform for advertising. Advertising is a new growth initiative for Walmart. So, in some ways, the $2.3 billion Vizio deal makes sense. Given Walmart's market cap of over $700 billion today, it's not exactly a huge transaction. The problem is that Walmart hasn't been specific about what Vizio brings to the retailer other than some new software. During the company's fourth quarter 2024 earnings call, Walmart CFO John David Rainey noted: