Big Q to dump Taiwan firms

A REPORT ON the Digitimes rumour mill suggests that Compaq is thinking of dispensing with two of its notebook PC manufacturers out of the four it already uses.

Those four are Quanta, Mitac, Arima and Inventec, according to the wire.

But the same wire reported some time back that Compaq had already given Mitac the order of the boot.

As we reported here earlier, Compaq will cut the number of its notebook lines down as part of the restructuring.

And a move to get the numbers of manufacturers down from four to two would also be in line with CEO Mike Capellas' aim to further narrow costs in what is euphemistically called the supply chain.

Digitimes does not seem entirely sure which of the four will feel the edge of the Capellas axe. But any of those four companies who dilly-dally with arch rival Dell - such as Quanta for example - might be the first to go.

Inventec struck a deal with Compaq which was pretty much exclusive, so may be safe from this element of the Capellas restructure. µ

See Also
Digitimes
Compaq dumps Mitac
Compaq's notebook eggs all in one basket
US IT jobs bleed to China
Capellas' 180 days memo