Seagate Technology Corp said there was no news it was aware of to account for a 75 cent – 6.7% – fall in its share price just over a week ago, but now the Wall Street Journal reveals that the company’s purchasing agents have been telling suppliers that they won’t get paid until 75 days after delivery, leading some to suspect that there is a severe cash crunch looming at the disk drive manufacturer, which had to take on $250m of debt to acquire Imprimis Technology: normal payment terms in the business are 30 days, when times are very tough companies try to extend it to 50 to 60 days; Seagate says that under its cash management programme, it tries to delay its payments at the end of every month, and suggests that the present terms are nothing unusual.
