Rush orders for solid-state drives (SSDs) increased last month in the wake of massive flooding in Thailand that caused a serious drop in hard disk drive supplies.
According to DRAMeXchange, a research division of TrendForce, rush orders for SSDs rose even as shipments of end-market products, including PCs, smartphones and tablet PCs, continued to drop because of sluggish economic conditions.
More than a dozen hard disk drive factories have been shut due to flooding in Thailand. PC manufacturers have been bracing for significant supply shortages. In the first half of 2011, Thailand accounted for 40 percent to 45 percent of worldwide hard disk drive production. As of early November, nearly half of Thailand's production was directly affected by the flooding.
