As you open multiple tabs searching for the most reliable laptop brands in today's market, you've probably seen Asus mentioned in rankings across user forums and tech blogs.
Unlike some of its biggest competitors also in the business of high-performance laptops, Asus doesn't have a single parent company or institutional shareholders taking up a significant chunk of ownership.
Although Asus is commonly mistaken for Acer as both companies are based in Taiwan, the two are completely separate businesses.
Asus was founded in 1989 by four former Acer engineers: Tzu-Hsien Tung, Ted Hsu, Wayne Hsieh, and M.T.
Today, only one of the founders, Ted Hsu, remains in Asus' leadership as its vice chairman, and Jonney Shih currently sits as the company's chairman, while S.Y.
As you open multiple tabs searching for the most reliable laptop brands in today's market, you've probably seen Asus mentioned in rankings across user forums and tech blogs. Over the last few decades, Asus has made a name for itself in consumer technology and in the gaming and creative community through its sub-brands Republic of Gamers (ROG), TUF, and ProArt.
Unlike some of its biggest competitors also in the business of high-performance laptops, Asus doesn't have a single parent company or institutional shareholders taking up a significant chunk of ownership. Instead, it is a publicly traded Taiwanese company also known as ASUSTeK Computer Inc., whose shares are spread across institutional and individual investors plus the general investing public. With public shareholders collectively owning the largest portion of the company, Asus has a more widely distributed ownership structure as compared to companies like Lenovo and Dell, whose stakes are mostly held by anchor shareholders or their founders, respectively.
Although Asus is commonly mistaken for Acer as both companies are based in Taiwan, the two are completely separate businesses. Asus was founded in 1989 by four former Acer engineers: Tzu-Hsien Tung, Ted Hsu, Wayne Hsieh, and M.T. Liao. Today, only one of the founders, Ted Hsu, remains in Asus' leadership as its vice chairman, and Jonney Shih currently sits as the company's chairman, while S.Y. Hsu and Samson Hu were appointed as co-CEOs in 2019. While its investor mix has naturally changed over the decades as shares have been bought and sold, Asus has not undergone a takeover or a merger that fundamentally altered who controls the company. It has, however, separated its manufacturing arm, Pegatron, into its own, independent company in 2010 to reduce friction between competing brands in terms of manufacturing hardware components.
