In what could alleviate high prices of hard disk drives (HDDs) after the devastating flood in Thailand that affected HDD foundries, industry sources predict that the reconstruction efforts of these foundries, led by Western Digital, will pay off to a large extant. In Q1 2012 alone, global volumes of HDDs are expected to restore to 80% of what they were before the floods. The global production of HDDs will increase to 140-145 million units.
HDD vendors across the board have exhausted their inventories in Dec-Jan when they supply PC/notebook ODMs their inventories of HDDs, but they haven't hiked quotes due to the off-season that followed. However, the flood situation isn't the only factor that will affect HDD prices. With increase in prices of raw materials, components, and labour-costs, HDD prices are expected to go up 30-40%.
Source: DigiTimes