Mark,
It wasn't just the factors that you listed. It was also the switch to BTO by their primary customers (PC vendors), and the effective entrance/re-entrance in to the market in a significant way of MXTR, Fujitsu, IBM and, to a lesser extent as far as I can gather, Samsung. The then "Big Three" didn't take the latter companies seriously enough, and therefore didn't push the density curve quickly enough to keep their share of the market.
I don't know about others, I'm know that I could not have predicted that on my own, ahead of the actual occurrence of the infamous event in the fall (both senses of the word) of 98. Some people came on the thread and said that this was possible, that DDs were commodities, things would get more competitive and prices would drop, and that was always a possibility that was acknowledged by many of us (I am especially thinking of the "much loved" Vanni Resti who has now apparently disappeared from these threads who said some of these things in spring 98, then in the summer said that she had been wrong when several of the stocks kept going up, and finally after the fall in the autumn claimed her earlier genius). But no one as far as I know--on this thread or not--predicted when that would actually occur, or who would do it.
You put down your money, you take your chances, and you go with the flow.
Best,
Sam |
