HDD Prices are Increasing Rapidly; 50% in One Week - Due to Thailand Floods

[totalgenius]

The hard drive market is reacting to the heavy floods in Thailand.

Prices for hard drives have jumped by as much as 50 percent within one week, market research firm IHS said. About a quarter of all hard drives are manufactured in Thailand and it appears that all major vendors are affected in some way.

Western Digital previously said that it may see a revenue decline of about 60 percent in the current quarter and told German publication Golem.de that it will be able to produce only 22 to 26 million drives this quarter, instead of the planned 58 million units. A spokesperson said that WD "currently waits for the factories to dry" to be able to restart its manufacturing tools. What makes matters worse are the usually thin profit margins in the HDD industry, which means that manufacturers typically have only five to seven days of material supply.

A Seagate manager told CRN India that the company expects and "acute" shortage of drives and that the manufacturer expects prices to increase. However, there was no information how sharp this increase can be. Both WD and Seagate said that the floods in Thailand have created a problem for the industry that will take several quarters to resolve.





By Douglas Perry
HDD Prices are Increasing Rapidly; 50% in One Week

 

[little_pob]

The report lask week on Bit-Tech were saying the shortage is likely to last the "December quarter". Also, manufacturers who's factories weren't flooded have had problems with supply roads and power being affected.

 

[NoodlesJoe]

do they only make HDD in Thailand?

 

[little_pob]

do they only make HDD in Thailand?

The report says about 25% are manufactured in Thailand.

However, even those assembled elsewhere, Malaysia for example, can contain parts that are manufactured in Thailand.

 

[Exos]

Regardless, resellers are already jumping on the price hike to cream what they can.

As soon as the announcements where made, the prices increased. Stock that's already in the country which was bought at previous prices before the floods are being sold at higher margin. As Pob knows, i've just bought 4 x 2TB drives, the price went from £54 ea to £79 ea in a matter of days, now your not telling me every supplier sold all their stock in that short space of time before having to order again from trade suppliers, whom also will have a much larger stock already before having to import more.

Right royally gets my knickers in a twist.

 

[oneman]

Same shit with oil price rises. As soon as barrel price goes up then forecourt price goes up even though stock is months old.

Of course its cashing in on the scaremongering, only thing is that I have not seen it filter to assembled PC yet.

 

[coolnow]

Guys, they have to increase the price of their current stock to offset some of the losses they'll incur due to the decreased supply.

 

[oneman]

Guys, they have to increase the price of their current stock to offset some of the losses they'll incur due to the decreased supply.

No they be suffering any losses due to decreased supply. Its not like end users can go to anybody else. They either pay the higher price or wait a couple of months for prices to drop again.

 

[Exos]

Guys, they have to increase the price of their current stock to offset some of the losses they'll incur due to the decreased supply.

That's not how it works suppliers, vendors, resellers and manufacturers all work on margins, now don't get me wrong there isn't very much in HDDs, but even so a trade supplier buys stock at say £20 a unit from a manufacturer, they add margin sell it to the retailer at £25 then they add margin and sell it to you and me at £35.

If the trade price goes up that knocks on, however the point here is that the current stock at the trade supplier AND the retailer was already bought so why should the consumer pay more in the short term


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[ManofScience]

it's like oneman says, crude oil goes up and the forecourts go up instantly even though the stock is months old. Yet,when prices drop they use the excuse "this the old price stock we're selling that was higher priced".

why should hard disk prices increase NOW when there's probably lots of stock already purchased at the cheaper price in boats on their way here now.