So very few hardware manufacturers in the Bitcoin ever delivered more wealth to their clients despite making grandiose claims. BFL was probably the biggest loudmouth of them all.
The only mass production hardware manufacturers are Bitmain, Avalon, KNC and BitFury. Bitmain is the best.
I think he/she was referring to past manufacturers (see title of thread). It seems even in the 4 you listed the opinions have swayed very far. Avalon was loved until Yifu cheated everybody. KNC was loved after their first/second batch and then went to hated.
Avalon is kinda hard as if were talking about past it's a different company things such as Yifu. If were talking about current it's considered "Canaan-Creative" but almost everyone still calls it Avalon. I never dealt with the company during the Yifu times (luckily). I have only dealt with the current one.
Another big one I dont see mentioned was asicminer. I mean they were the game for a while with block erupters, then blades, then that box. And now they are nothing. Who would have guessed that when they number 1 for so long.
As far as I am concerned "Yifu" was nothing more than a fall guy. Avalon was always determined to make as much as possible through whatever means possible, customers be damned. I was one of the many hundreds who got scammed by Avalon back in 2012/2013 and I personally refuse to forgive them. I don't care who they say they are run by or what they changed their name to.
The only reason I suspect they are doing better business now is that they have so much money from cheating people in 2012/2013 that they no longer find that route profitable.