$340K Worth of MSI RTX 3090 GPUs Stolen in Factory Heist
MSI has announced today that $340,000 worth of Nvidia RTX 3090 GPUs have been stolen from its factory. The theft, which is theorized to have involved as many as 10 GPUs given current prices, may have been an inside job.
More seriously, MSI states that 40 “boxes” of RTX 3090 GPUs were affected with a value of $336,500. MSRP on the RTX 3090 is $1,500, so we’re talking about 170 to 220 GPUs depending on selling prices. The company’s shipping area is covered by factory surveillance and it inspects trucks coming and going from the facility, which is part of why the firm suspects it may have a thief on the inside.
MSI Chinese mainland factory was stolen, stolen 40 boxes RTX3090, the total value of 2200000RMB ……😓MSI has been officially announced and informed to the police ,Reward of 100000 RMB for reporting effective information. pic.twitter.com/JWw8hOMioG
— 夕惕若厉 (@GoFlying8) December 7, 2020
This is the second issue for MSI in recent months that involved inventory allocation ending up somewhere it wasn’t supposed to be. Back in early October, the company took heat for the fact that one of its subsidiaries, Starlit Partner, was selling MSI RTX 3080 and RTX 3090 cards for well above MSRP, even as these GPUs were sold out at Amazon and Newegg.
Regarding Starlit Partner/eBay: pic.twitter.com/QqRDBNRdVa
— MSI Gaming USA (@msiUSA) October 7, 2020
We have no information on whether the two incidents could be related in any fashion. In one case, an OEM partner somehow gained access to GPUs it should not have been allowed to resell and then sold them far above MSRP, but this could be explained by anything from an inventory system error to an inside decision to “accidentally” funnel some cards to a company that shouldn’t have been allowed to sell them. That’s potentially a very different type of crime from arranging for a bunch of MSI GPUs to get loaded on the wrong truck without anyone noticing.
Anyone with knowledge of the theft can contact MSI for a 100,000 Yaun / $15,000 reward. Any participant in the theft is offered clemency, provided they help to locate the stolen items.
The theft is another symptom of how bad the allocation of pretty much everything is right now, and what’s that doing to prices. There are RTX 3090 GPUs on eBay listing as having sold for $2,500 or more, which shows why someone would take the challenge on in the first place. Two hundred RTX 3090 GPUs at $2,500 each is a cool $500K.
Unfortunately, these prices are also why there’s no way to get your hands on much of the latest technology from Intel, AMD, Nvidia, Sony, or Microsoft. Low yields, high demand, and COVID-damaged supply lines have collectively made shipping products difficult. Hopefully, MSI is able to recover its property and find whichever individual at the company is responsible for the thefts.
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