Industrial Minerals


Rare earth costs hit hard-disk manufacturers

22 July 2011

by Mark Watts

Seagate Technology says rare earth prices key factor in squeezing profit margin

Keywords: rare earths, neodymium, dysprosium, hard disk, magnets

The soaring costs of rare earths are shown to be impacting the profit margins of hi-tech component producers, quarterly results reveal.

Seagate Technology, a major California-based hard disk drive and storage company, said it could no longer offset rare earth and other raw materials prices with cost-cutting measures.

The company shipped 52m. disk drives in its fiscal fourth quarter, making a revenue of $2.9bn with $126m. in...