by Anton Shilov
09/18/2002 | 09:23 AM
Present condition of computer components’ market is very weak. Large companies do not want to invest in PCs, consumers also do not desire to spend hundreds and even thousands of dollars on new computer. As a result, those manufacturers who offered high-end and high-performance devices now suffer from considerable decrease of demand on such goods.
ABIT has been focused on making mainboards for enthusiasts, with loads of features for overclockers and tweakers. Now there are significantly less of those, who tune their PC’s performance, as a result, ABIT has considerably less customers. This summer the company decided to start manufacturing barebone PCs and servers as well as outsource part of their mainboards, generally intended for low-end and mainstream sectors, to Elitegroup Computer Systems in order to cut-down manufacturing expenses. It was quite clear that ABIT will seriously reconsider its business strategy and by now The Inquirer has confirmed it.<%BANNER[article]%>
Definitely, going from retail to OEM model will allow the company to improve its sales and get some long-lasting contracts. Since generally OEM market is much more stable, the company will avoid product’s write-offs and unpredictable price-cuts that often happen on retail market. Cutting down manufacturing costs will also heighten the company’s gross margin
ABIT will continue to offer high-end mainboards for enthusiasts, however, there share of such products will be considerably smaller than it used to be in the past.