Competition in the hard drive sector has done wonders for consumer pricing, but it’s about to take a toll on another supplier. According to Reuters Samsung is looking to exit the spinning disk sector by selling off the losing division as soon as possible. Sources quoted by the newspaper claim they are hoping to rake in as much as $1.5 billion from the sale, but might be willing to entertain bids as low as $1 billion if necessary.Speculation as to possible suitors pretty much starts and ends with Seagate since Western Digital is in the early days of their merger with Hitachi. Western Digital by comparison paid about $4.3 billion for Hitachi, however Hitachi had a much larger share of the market to back up the price. Samsung still has a very robust component business including memory chips and flat screens, however it never seems to have established itself in the hard drive sector.
Neither Samsung or Seagate have made any official comment on the matter, but expect to hear more in the coming weeks.
