IBM Japan, HP Japan lead way in Unix server price war - Brief Article

Japan, Inc., June, 2003

... IN BRIEF: The Japan arms of foreign giants IBM and Hewlett Packard slashed prices of Unix servers in late April in a move that will almost certainly going to pressure NEC, Fujitsu and other domestic server makers to follow suit. IBM Japan cut the prices of its p630 and p650 servers by as much as half, and HP Japan cut prices on servers like its rp4705 midsize server by as much as 20 percent.

... COMMENTARY: The price cuts are liable to prompt Japan's big makers and Sun Microsystem to respond, and eventually some of the less agile competitors are likely to be forced out of the market. After all, the overall market for servers has been shrinking, yet foreign shipments to Japan have jumped this year as much as 30 percent.