China's devastating earthquake has left tens of thousands dead and many more injured and homeless. Today, the nation begins to mourn. Flags are flying at half-mast and the nation came to a stand still earlier this morning to observe a three-minute silence, during which, the stock exchanges halted all trading.
In the tech industry, the world's largest semiconductor manufacturer, Intel, was forced to close a chip-packaging factory in Chengdu, 60 miles from the quake's epicentre.
Though the plant itself has now re-opened, and production resumed, Intel chipsets are reported to be seeing an increase in price as a consequence of the closure and severely-disrupted local transport.
Motherboard manufacturers claim that Intel's G31, G33 and 945GC chipsets will all be rising in price. In quantities of one thousand, the G31 will move from $23 to $25-27, the G33 from $28 to $31 and the 945GC from $15 to $18-19.
Despite the increases, consumers are unlikely to see any alteration in prices as the costs are expected to be absorbed by motherboard manufacturers themselves.
Intel, who has been analysing seismic activity over the past few days, has stated that it believes the quake's impact to be limited. Nonetheless, Christopher Danely, an analyst with J.P.Morgan suggests that the Chengu facility accounts for 20 - 25 per cent of the company's assembly and test activities for desktop and mobile processors and chipsets. Danely believes that the need to scrap some material at the plant could boost the cost of goods sold in the current quarter by 25-50 basis points.
