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Technology Stocks : Read-Rite -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Earthdog who wrote (2689)	12/25/1997 10:57:00 AM
From: CPAMarty	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 5058

Allen, there is a possiblility that RDRT will pick up Seagate as a customer in the near future. What signs would indicate a recovery to you?

To: Earthdog who wrote (2689)	12/25/1997 1:38:00 PM
From: T Bowl	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 5058

Allan <<1)...What are they doing to insure that they'll have more customers, retain their present customers and gain more market share, in the coming months?>> They will gain share at WDC in the next few Qs. The quicker transition to MR is and will continue to hurt APM. QNTM is a prize they MUST get back(but who knows whether they will) and SEG is currently looking to outsource heads. Also, Maxtor is a very good customer of theirs, and looks to be doing well in these times. Samsung scares me(from a DD player side). I'm happy to see RDRT affiliated with them. <<3) According to a friend of mine, who use to work at Read Rite, he says that they are at least a year and a half behind schedule, but they do have a great program going on with very dedicated people. >> Behind on what? MR? GMR? Plant construction? It is certainly not MR heads. They've qual'd 2.1GB heads with 3 pgms(WDC, Samsung, Maxtor) You'll see 2.8GB heads in March. They are movoing as fast as anyone in the industry. GMR? Well, as far as I can tell, they plan on producing GMR heads in early 1999 which I believe has been the plan for a while, a seems to fit with the rest of the industry. Everyone is behind IBM(and always will be) Please tell what you mean by behind. <<4) ...RDRT Fremont was built on an old "Indian Burial Site.">> Oh come on dude. Are you serious? <<5) The whole disk drive industry is starting to take a bad turn with Seagate stopping the construction of their plant in Ireland and laying off 1400 employees>> From my standpoint, this is a good thing for the industry. What we need right now is less capacity. (And it always helps when the shutdowns and cancelations happen at a company I'm not invested in) Even the Akashic layoff news is a good thing IMO. I presonally hope to see more reduction plans announced(and expect to see it in the next few months - we'll see a few players crash and burn IMO) todd

To: Earthdog who wrote (2689)	12/25/1997 8:39:00 PM
From: Stitch	Respond to of 5058

Allen; You mention IBM's ramp as a looming problem for Read-Rite. As far as I know IBM hasnt been much of a force in the OEM supply of heads to other disk drive makers. In fact, IBM's history of supplying OEM parts is fraught with failed promises and the other DD makers wouldnt trust them based on that history. Re: Thailand and 3.5 years to open a plant. When Read-Rite first went to Thailand it took them less then a year to build , open, and initially staff and train an employee base. Including telephones by the way. re: Read-Rite a year and a half behind schedule? For what? Re: you said <The whole disk drive industry is starting to take a bad turn with Seagate stopping the construction of their plant in Ireland and laying off 1400 employees,> Gee thanks for the timely post. My goodness. What to do what to do? FYI: Seagte followed the Ireland announcement with a a reafirmation of their expansion in Cebu, Philipines. 5000 employees. I think you should focus on correlating Indian graveyards with failed companies. Now THAT would be an interesting post. PS, Thanks for the disclaimer...its the most accurate thing you said. Stitch