Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!decwrl!sun!pepper!cmcmanis
From: cmcmanis%pepper@Sun.COM (Chuck McManis)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Memory Prices
Keywords: What's the story?!
Message-ID: <59599@sun.uucp>
Date: 12 Jul 88 22:17:29 GMT
References: <1691@vu-vlsi.Villanova.EDU>
Sender: news@sun.uucp
Reply-To: cmcmanis@sun.UUCP (Chuck McManis)
Distribution: na
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Mountain View
Lines: 18

In article <1691@vu-vlsi.Villanova.EDU> (Wilson Cheung) writes:
->	I am aware that the trade barriers against Japan are now really starting
->to have its effect on memory chip prices.  However, what I don't understand
->is why one company is selling 2 Megs of RAM (chips only) for around $800 and
->others seem to be selling 2 Meg fully populated boards with expansion chasis
->at prices like $700.  Why the trememdous difference in price?  Are some 
->companies getting secret duty-free supply lines from Japan?

Some companies make their own DRAMs, Micron comes to mind. Their cost of 
making memory chips has not gone up, so they could conceivably sell RAM
at pre-shortage prices, but this is America after all, so they raise their
price to dampen demand until it is exactly equal to their production capacity
(actually until it is just above their capacity) and then squirrel away the
profits or invest heavily in new equipment so that they can meet the Japanese
head on with 8" wafers and 4 meg chips.

--Chuck McManis
uucp: {anywhere}!sun!cmcmanis   BIX: cmcmanis  ARPAnet: cmcmanis@sun.com
These opinions are my own and no one elses, but you knew that didn't you.