Lines like, "At the same time, like all makers of memory, Toshiba and Western Digital balance their output in accordance with market demand so not to overproduce and ruin pricing," can be abused to give one the idea that multiple companies are coordinating production to keep the screws turned on supply so they can price gouge on solid state memory. In fact, you could argue that the fact that two companies, Toshiba and Western Digital, are working together to clamp production that there really is cross-business price fixing. Not really though, I get it that they need to not flood the market with products or they'll hit a point where products sell at low or negative margins.
think the same thing, what easier way to directly influence pricing if they can do behind closed doors meetings because they both operate behind those doors.
I still really do not get why various makers price things the way they do, costs $1 to make, $20 to have on a shelf, but they price at $100-$300-$500+..is disgusting, they can price more reasonable pricing and still make a killing...they really should (all of the tech world) put some of that revenue towards ease of "tear down" for reducing electronics waste....lord knows they price things at crazy pricing, why can they not at least make them far far easier to dispose of in a less pollution fashion ^.^
What, there are companies making things for $1 and selling them for $100-$300-$500+. Sounds amazing, that like a 99%+ gross margin, where do I buy shares?
Checks WDC forecasts for this year - gross margin 38%, net margin 17%
First of all, it’s not true. Second of all, it’s more complicated than that. Manufacturers of equipment that use memory need to certify that memory, because it’s part of their product.
Back in 1998, when I bought an expensive 12 x 18 color laser printer for Hp, I wanted to buy more memory. I called Hp. They were selling a 16MB stick fo $660, while I could buy it somewhere else for half that. I asked why. I was to,d that because it was part of their product, they needed to test the sticks and certify them, because companies wanted to buy the whole thing at once, and not buy memory separately. Then there was the problem of removing memory that wasn’t from Hp when doing a repair.
Manufacturers of smartphones, etc. have the same problem. They need to make certain the memory meets their specs, so that people don’t complain about performance. That extra testing costs money.
In addition, the final price of a product, according to standard manufacturing accounting procedures is between 2.5 and 3.5 times the price of the parts.
So, for example, you see a phone broken down, and an estimate of the parts cost is given. If the parts cost, say $300, then the phone will cost between $750 and $900. That’s normal. That takes into count all of the cos of actually running the company, which is something that many people aren’t thinking about. The same Thing is true for the parts inside.
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brakdoo - Thursday, September 20, 2018 - link
You are funny: "Fab 3 and Fab 4 are used to make other kinds of products"Fab 3 and 4 are used to make 2D NAND and the conversion is still progressing.
PeachNCream - Thursday, September 20, 2018 - link
Lines like, "At the same time, like all makers of memory, Toshiba and Western Digital balance their output in accordance with market demand so not to overproduce and ruin pricing," can be abused to give one the idea that multiple companies are coordinating production to keep the screws turned on supply so they can price gouge on solid state memory. In fact, you could argue that the fact that two companies, Toshiba and Western Digital, are working together to clamp production that there really is cross-business price fixing. Not really though, I get it that they need to not flood the market with products or they'll hit a point where products sell at low or negative margins.Dragonstongue - Thursday, September 20, 2018 - link
think the same thing, what easier way to directly influence pricing if they can do behind closed doors meetings because they both operate behind those doors.I still really do not get why various makers price things the way they do, costs $1 to make, $20 to have on a shelf, but they price at $100-$300-$500+..is disgusting, they can price more reasonable pricing and still make a killing...they really should (all of the tech world) put some of that revenue towards ease of "tear down" for reducing electronics waste....lord knows they price things at crazy pricing, why can they not at least make them far far easier to dispose of in a less pollution fashion ^.^
Speedfriend - Friday, September 21, 2018 - link
What, there are companies making things for $1 and selling them for $100-$300-$500+. Sounds amazing, that like a 99%+ gross margin, where do I buy shares?Checks WDC forecasts for this year - gross margin 38%, net margin 17%
Maybe not...
melgross - Wednesday, September 26, 2018 - link
First of all, it’s not true. Second of all, it’s more complicated than that. Manufacturers of equipment that use memory need to certify that memory, because it’s part of their product.Back in 1998, when I bought an expensive 12 x 18 color laser printer for Hp, I wanted to buy more memory. I called Hp. They were selling a 16MB stick fo $660, while I could buy it somewhere else for half that. I asked why. I was to,d that because it was part of their product, they needed to test the sticks and certify them, because companies wanted to buy the whole thing at once, and not buy memory separately. Then there was the problem of removing memory that wasn’t from Hp when doing a repair.
Manufacturers of smartphones, etc. have the same problem. They need to make certain the memory meets their specs, so that people don’t complain about performance. That extra testing costs money.
In addition, the final price of a product, according to standard manufacturing accounting procedures is between 2.5 and 3.5 times the price of the parts.
So, for example, you see a phone broken down, and an estimate of the parts cost is given. If the parts cost, say $300, then the phone will cost between $750 and $900. That’s normal. That takes into count all of the cos of actually running the company, which is something that many people aren’t thinking about. The same Thing is true for the parts inside.
ballsystemlord - Thursday, September 27, 2018 - link
[Whispers] Nvidia, Nvidia, Nvidia...