It is fairly easy to state that 2020 has had a deep effect on the supply chain mechanics of creating electronics and electronic components. Not only have there been logistical challenges in meeting regular levels of production, but the increase in demand due to work-from-home measures is putting additional strain up and down the ecosystem. On top of this, continued volatility with regards to trade and tariffs have been leaving more questions unanswered as to how companies involved in the results of all of this should engineer their operations.

To that end, ASUS has put out a statement through its public Facebook group stating that it will be increasing MSRP on components, with graphics cards and motherboards being highlighted as the initial targets, with more to potentially follow. The reasons for this are described in the post, made by long-time ASUS employee Juan Jose Guerrero III, are due to ‘increases in cost for components, operating costs, and logistical activities plus a continuation of import tariffs’. Guerrero goes on to say that ASUS ‘worked closely with our supply logistic partners to minimise price increases’.  

The exact scale of the price increases will be borne through the next few weeks, as the price adjustments work their way through the supply chain to distributors and finally retailers. ASUS is a large scale production house for both AIB graphics cards and motherboards, and can often deal with economies of scale, so the fact that the company has chosen to be open about its MSRP increases should indicate that other similar businesses might have changes coming soon, if not already applied, given that the issue of component costs, logistics, and import tariffs are industry wide and not just limited to one company. ASUS highlights that these are two initial product lines, and ‘additional models may see an increase as we move further into Q1’.

Should an exact price differential list be made public, we will share it.  

Source: ASUS PC DIY Group (Facebook)

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  • Tom Sunday - Monday, February 8, 2021 - link

    A contact in Hamburg informed this morning that NVIDIA in a recent Germany communication noted that the RTX 3000 Series will for the entire 2021 first quarter to be even more difficult to obtain. And especially the availability of the GeForce RTX 3090, 3080, 3070 and 3060 Ti. The Chinese New Year which begins on February 12 is only partially to blame for its 15-day shutdown of the factories. The specific source of this communication came though "Alternate" (Shift IT) with major distribution centers in Germany, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands. This most likely will keep at least for the time being the 'second hand used pricing ' and the purchases of new available GPU's at much higher price points. I would also suspect that this further delay of availabilities may impact itself on the MSRP pricing of the entire 3000 series once the market comes into full-swing. FYI: I just took delivery of a new LG refrigerator after having to wait for it's delivery 120-days. The big deal...a price increase over the 2020 model of 35%. This sounds like Z590 mobos which may have come on the same boat?

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