Hurricane Irma raged across the Atlantic from late August to mid September. The storm wreaked havoc on anything that lay in its path, with a reported 72 deaths and untold property damage ravaging several countries, including the mainland U.S. Now it seems the storm's effects will be felt in the tech industry, because shipments of MSI's latest motherboard, the X370 Gaming M7 ACK, were delayed by Hurricane Irma.
The X370 Gaming M7 ACK officially debuted on September 6. But when we checked several retailers, we found that only B&H had the motherboard listed, so we contacted MSI to find out why the board wasn't available at any of the usual retailers. (We didn't expect it to be sold out, because at least then retailers would say as much on their websites, instead of simply omitting the motherboard from their stores entirely.)
An MSI spokesperson told us that the company was "still in the process of receiving shipment" because a "sea shipment which was supposed to be in Miami port" was delayed by Hurricane Irma. Once that shipment finally made it to shore, it still had to reach MSI, which would then ship the stock to retailers like Amazon and Newegg. The X370 Gaming M7 ACK's launch, at least in the U.S., was pretty much dead in the water. The delay has affected North America, but we aren't yet sure about other regions. Further, the issue is a delay only--there have been no reports of damage to any merchandise.
We aren't privy to whether or not any other MSI merchandise has been similarly delayed.
A delayed motherboard shipment pales in comparison to the many other problems caused by Irma and the other hurricanes that have (and will) tear across the ocean this year. But chances are good that MSI isn't the only company affected by delayed shipments, and motherboards probably aren't the only products that will take longer than expected to reach the U.S. This could have a significant effect on tech companies' bottom lines.
We've reached out to other companies to learn more about how these hurricanes might have affected their shipments.
