Samsung is looking to sell the firm’s loss-making hard drive business for as much as $1.5 billion according to a Wall Street Journal report.
The Journal cited a ‘person familiar with the matter’ in claiming that the Korean electronics giant would seek a sale so it could invest in ‘new growth areas’. Speculation arose that hard-drive giant Seagate could be a likely buyer as it seeks to compete with arch-rival Western Digital.
The world’s largest hard drive maker Western Digital recently executed a $4.3 billion buy-out of enterprise storage specialist Hitachi GST.
Industry watch site the DigiTimes was less optimistic calling a Seagate move to buy Samsung’s hard drive business "questionable." The DigiTimes highlighted Seagate’s plummeting profits, down over 70 per-cent year-on-year in the fourth quarter of 2010.
"The company’s current finance status may not allow the company to perform acquisition," they said.