Cordata Cuts Computer Prices by 30%

Cordata, a Thousand Oaks maker of IBM-compatible personal computers, said Monday that it is cutting prices by about 30% and upgrading its computers to include more memory and storage capacity.

The company’s price cuts follow by less than a week an announcement by industry leader IBM that it will trim prices of its computer products from 5% to 25%.

Cordata executives said their price cuts were planned in advance of IBM’s disclosure and denied that the announcement influenced their decision. Cordata President Daniel Carter said he was relieved, in fact, that IBM’s price cuts weren’t bigger. He said there were rumors that IBM’s cuts might be as high as 50%.

Cordata, formerly called Corona Data Systems, said it can afford the cuts because of falling computer component prices and the financial backing it has from Daewoo, one of Korea’s largest industrial firms. Cordata’s computers are made in Korea under an agreement with Daewoo.

As an example of its price cuts, Cordata said it cut to $1,995, from $2,295, the price of its PC-205, a personal computer similar to IBM’s latest XT personal computer, which sells for about $2,895. Cordata said it also upgraded the PC-205 to include a 20-megabyte hard-disk drive, the device that records and retrieves data in a personal computer. Previously, the model included a 10-megabyte drive.

Cordata, a privately held company, had sales of more than $50 million in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30 and employs 220 people in Thousand Oaks, Westlake Village and Newbury Park.