CMC Magnetics has announced a slight increase in September revenues from August, and other Taiwanese CD-R disc makers are set to report similar results, aided by buying in anticipation of October price hikes, an industry executive said. CMC Magnetics, in its just-released report, said its revenues rose a slight NT$25 million to NT$1.44 billion in September. Ritek, Taiwan’s largest CD-R disc manufacturer, said it expected revenues to grow to NT$1.4 billion last month from NT$1.3 billion in August.

The two companies kick-started price increases ranging from 10% to 15% this month. Therefore, some of their customers might have bulked up orders in the past month to take advantage of lower pricing.

Bob Wong, CEO of CMC, said CD-R disc prices will have more room to grow as distributors in the US are expected to increase inventories to hedge against shipment disruption as talks to resolve the West Coast port labor lockout drag on.

Also helping drive up prices is the European Union’s (EU) pending ruling on alleged dumping by Moser Baer India (MBI). A punitive levy on the India disc maker’s disc imports into Europe could fuel demand for competing discs, Wong said.

CMC said it is considering bumping up disc prices by another 10% in the first quarter of next year.

CD-R disc prices currently are quoted at between US$0.16 and US$0.17 per disc, and between US$0.26 to US$0.27 including packaging, according to Wong.

Second-tier disc makers also experienced a business upturn in September.

GigaStorage’s revenues hit an all-time high last month at NT$161 million, a 42.4% increase from August.

Lead Data estimated its revenues came in at NT$290 million, up from NT$237 million in August.