Western Digital / IRVINE
Nature of business: Personal computer hard disk drives, semiconductors and other elements. Total employees: 7,322 In Orange County: 1,380 Stock listing in The Times: On NYSE “WDIGITL” Ticker symbol: “WDC” Friday’s stock close: $5.13 One-week change: Down $0.12 *
Analyst review: “Western Digital has endured a series of losses, although it is still the industry technical leader. Its margins have improved and a good thing happened to them last month when they signed an agreement with IBM, which will produce Western Digital’s disk drives at its Havant, England plant. Drives produced there will be sold to the European market. The agreement increases Western Digital’s manufacturing capacity by 30% to 40%, and allows it to cut costs. The primary challenge facing it now is cash. It raised upwards of $100 million by selling off its semiconductor plant, so they have enough cash. But the question now is expansion. As things look up, Western Digital will most likely raise more money, but its balance sheet is weak right now.”--James A. Stone, analyst Pennsylvania Merchant Group, Philadelphia
Revenue and profit
Chart amount in millions
Fiscal year ending June 30: 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 Revenue $994 $1,074 $986 $938 $1,225 Profit (loss) $34.3 $24.2 ($134) ($72.9) ($25.1)
Corporate outlook: “Western Digital has established and maintained technology and time-to-market leadership in the disk drives industry with our Caviar Architecture 1 designs. Our share of business with priority PC systems vendors like AST, Dell, Gateway, IBM, NEC and Zenith continues to grow. We are making our cost structure more competitive and reducing our expenses.” --Charles A. Haggerty, chairman/CEO
RETURN ON INVESTMENT: FIVE-YEAR SUMMARY
Fiscal year ending June 30 June 30 June 30 June 30 1989 1990 1991 1992 52-week high $16.25 $14.88 $14.25 $5.63 52-week low $8.63 $5.75 $3.50 $2.00 Book value per share $10.38 $11.03 $6.34 $3.84 Price per share $10.13 $13.25 $4.00 $4.25 Net earnings (loss) per share $1.18 $0.82 ($4.59) ($2.49) Price-to-earnings ratio 9:1 16:1 N/A N/A Avg. return on investor equity 11.4% 7.5% N/A N/A
Fiscal year ending June 30 1993 52-week high $9.63 52-week low $3.63 Book value per share $3.71 Price per share $3.88 Net earnings (loss) per share ($0.79) Price-to-earnings ratio N/A Avg. return on investor equity N/A
For more information call or write, Western Digital Corp.: 8105 Irvine Center Drive, Irvine, Calif., 92718. (714) 932-5000. Source: Western Digital Corp.; Bloomberg Business News.
