ECON 1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Digital Equipment Corporation, Vertical Integration, Fixed Cost
Document Summary
Digital equipment corporation, a company which in 1987 heavily relied on minicomputers and mainframes and was also vertically integrated to produce almost every major component used by computers. Dec was able to produce wire boars, memory, thin film magnetics, disks, power supplies and so on. Physically this included 33 plants in 13 counties, with 30 distribution and repair centers. Because of the stock market crash of october 19, 1987 and the subsequent market turmoil in. 1990-1991, along with rapid changes in computer and communications technology demand for dec changed. Instead of large computers, the demand shifted to less expensive personal computers. This meant dec had to change as well. Digital changed its strategy of high vertical integration and eventually focused on several core technologies and competencies. It stopped manufacturing power supplies, cables, printed wire boards and keyboards. The effect of this change was that less space and capacity was required.
