Toshiba buyers in yen heaven

By MICHAEL FOREMAN

Mobile PC manufacturer Toshiba has cut prices across its notebook range by up to 11.8 per cent, thanks to a favourable exchange rate against the Japanese yen.

The biggest price cut is on the high-end 600MHz Tecra 8100, which drops by $975 from $8255 to $7280, but prices of the mid-range Satellite and Portege models have also been marked down.

"We realise that we are going against the industry grain here but the connection to Japan is working to our advantage this time," said New Zealand country manager, Steve Ford.

Australasian marketing manager Mark Whittard said Toshiba was able to take an aggressive pricing position because of the high level of components manufactured by the company in Japan.

Toshiba was unique among mobile PC makers as it manufactured its own LCD screens, hard drives and DVD drives.

As these components were priced in Japanese yen, the company had largely avoided the inflationary effects of the strong US dollar.

Though Mr Whittard hoped that the price cuts would increase Toshiba's market share, he said the company was already making "humungous volumes of sales" globally and locally.

He said third-quarter figures due from research company IDC this week were likely to show Toshiba once again leading the New Zealand laptop market with around a 38 to 39 per cent market share, slightly ahead of its 37 per cent share last quarter.