Dell Inc. said Tuesday that an industrywide shortage of computer storage drives resulting from recent flooding in Thailand is likely to hurt the computer maker for a couple quarters. As a result, Dell now expects its revenue for the full year to be near the low end of the guidance it gave in August, which was for growth of 1 percent to 5 percent and was itself a reduction from an earlier forecast.
During a conference call with analysts to discuss the company’s third-quarter results and guidance, Brian Gladden, Dell’s chief financial officer, responded to a question about how the company is figuring the shortage into its outlook.
QUESTION: How much of the storage disk drive shortage is accounted for in your outlook?
ANSWER: The outlook that we provided fully contemplates what we know now. And so we’ve incorporated everything we know and how we think we’re going to manage through that in the outlook that we provided for the fourth quarter and the total year.
