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

To: Jim Goodman who wrote (3643)	7/10/1998 4:58:00 PM
From: CPAMarty	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 5058

from yahoo........ some rdrt feedback from: divBis0 Jul 10 1998 2:27PM EDTIve been digging around and got a lot of info from this and other boards as well as my own inside info and would like to return some of it. Disk drive industry: On the rebound, albeit a little slower than people want or think. Probably Octoberish. IBM: Perhaps not so much of a threat to the apms and rdrt's as originally thought. Difficulty in getting their heads to work at WD and maxtor at least. TDK and other Japanese: Ostensibly clear and dangerous competition to rdrt, hi quality and decreasing cost from yen. However, by supplying to rdrts customers they have kept them healthy and solvent, and thus preserved rdrts customer base until rdrt can get the MR act in order. (global marketplace in action) APM: Tightly managed company, generally focussed on cost cutting and high margins. Perhaps same philosophy caused them to hold onto thin film too long and have up until 2 qrts ago essentially no R+D cost. Result is that they were so late into mr that the company has abandoned mr and will now seriously focus into 4+ gig drives with gmr. Unfortunately inside r+d sources indicate that this effort is not going well (sort of way mr went...). Guess: apm will end up as an hsa assembly house. Long value: $5 to 8. RDRT: On the positive side, rdrts committment to mr and gmr is total, but this is hi cost short term so they lose money for a little while. Acceptance on 3.5gig maxtor is a major coup, this says that they have Mr as good as japanese (ibm dropped!). Although technically positioned well, rdrts problem appears to be one of cost and margin. Rdrt has very hi G+A costs (5 times apm) and their political infighting and topheavy management overlap is stuff of legends (there is justification behind pman701's rage). I like rdrt as a risky stock that could be 16 to 20 in a year or so. But there are still downsides ahead as rdrt pays for the mr and gmr manufacturing development. ÿ