OCZ Files for Bankruptcy - Toshiba Offers to Buy the Assets
by Kristian Vättö on November 27, 2013 3:30 PM EST
OCZ has just issued a press release announcing their filing for bankruptcy, which was expected since Nasdaq had halted the trading of OCZ stock earlier today. OCZ has had financial issues for quite a long time and it was just a matter of time before the inevitable happened. While OCZ did try to change its course by reforming their product portfolio when Ryan Petersen, the former CEO of OCZ, stepped down, it seems that the efforts weren't enough to make the business profitable.
OCZ leaves behind a noticeable amount of assets, most importantly its engineering teams in California, South Korea and Great Britain thanks to the prior acquisitions of PLX and Indilinx. Toshiba has already offered to buy OCZ's assets but currently there is no certainty on whether the deal will be completed. Toshiba's offer is, as expected, subject to various conditions such as retention of the employees because it obviously makes no sense to buy the assets unless Toshiba also gets the immaterial capital that is integrated into the employees. We'll have to wait and see how the deal turns out but at this point I recommend not buying any OCZ products because there is no guarantee that warranties will be honored.
It's sad to see OCZ going because they've been one of the pioneers in the consumer SSD industry. They were one of the most active companies when we started to see the first consumer SSDs in 2008/2009 but OCZ lost a ton of sales once Samsung and other major OEMs began to take the consumer SSD market seriously. It's hard to say what ultimately killed OCZ without knowing their exact cost structure but I believe it was a combination of bad strategy (too many products and high production volumes) and engineering choices (low reliability) along with other things.
What happens to OCZ now depends on the completion of the Toshiba deal. Even if Toshiba completes the purchase of OCZ's assets, I doubt we'll see the OCZ brand anymore. OCZ's brand image took a hit with the low reliability, so I doubt Toshiba will see the OCZ brand adding any value to its products. I do hope that the deal goes through because OCZ's Indilinx Barefoot 3 platform has a lot of potential and it would be lamentable to see all that hard work to be flushed down the toilet.
Source: Nasdaq
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iwod - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Interesting. Do you have any good guess as to why Apple/Toshiba decided to disable RAISE?Kristian Vättö - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
Likely to match the capacity. RAISE-enabled SSDs are 120GB, 240GB, 480GB... while the Samsung and SanDisk SSDs that Apple also uses are 256GB and 512GB (Toshiba only used in 64GB and 128GB flavors). It might have caused confusion and would have been bad for marketing, especially as Apple doesn't like to talk about the components in detail.edwardhchan - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Wow, good thing I just RMA'd my latest defective drive in time :P Yeah, gonna start retiring the OCZ sandforce drives for good now I guess.BrianTho2010 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Farewell OCZ. There are/were a lot of great guys there who really worked hard to provide great products. Back in the DDR1 days they were one of the big supporters of over clocking and helped to develop memory over clocking theory. They will be missed.eanazag - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Reliability was a reason I stayed away from their drives.What happens to PC Power & Cooling? OCZ owns them too. I have a PS from them and would buy more from them. I'm very happy with what I have gotten from PC Power & Cooling. There is no reason they should go under with the OCZ ship.
Eletriarnation - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Yeah, I'd be curious to know that too. PCP&C is a pretty venerable brand as components go, I remember reading a book ten years ago where the author swore by their units. I had been concerned that their quality might drop off when they got bought but I haven't heard much about them since that.bobbozzo - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
PCP&C sell great products, but most of them are designed and/or manufactured by SeaSonic.I bought one fairly recently because it was a good fit for an odd HTPC case I have and it was cheaper than a similar SeaSonic-branded PSU.
If PCP&C go under, they will be missed, somewhat.
althaz - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Manufactured - yes, but frequently not designed (although IMO the Seasonic designed stuff is better, which is why I own exclusively their PSUs).I won't miss OCZ overly (though they made good RAM), but PCP&C will definitely be missed.
Communism - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Every single stick of ram I have purchased from them, as well as every single stick my friends have purchased from them have been defective (obviously on purpose) and corrupted our installs innumerable times.They shouldn't just die, they should be banned from existing.
Communism - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
After that experience, the only RAM I and my friends purchase is Crucial (Micron).Non-ram manufacturers don't care enough about their reputation enough not to screw you over and over and over.
I made the exact same recommendation back in the day when Sandforce came out for people to use Crucial (Micron) drives because they also make the memory chips for those drives.
The people who didn't listen got screwed over and over by their defective drives.