EK seems to be having major issues

[A&P211]

I'm not into water cooling, I run a laptop, but seems that EK is having major issues.

*i love tech jesus, aka steve, awesome youtube channel.

 

[kapone32]

EK charge way too much for their products and the quality is not what it used to be. In the Watercooling space Byiski is less expensive and Alphacool is more flexible and less expensive.

 

[Keullo-e]

EK charge way too much for their products and the quality is not what it used to be. In the Watercooling space Byiski is less expensive and Alphacool is more flexible and less expensive.

EK has made the classic mistake having people trust their brand too much. We've seen similar shit from many manufacturers (or their brands) many times.

Agree with that Alphacool opinion. Basically I haven't seen a crappy product from them.

 

[A Computer Guy]

I was thinking of posting that video earlier with a survey but you beat me to it.

"Is the industry going to loose a major water cooling supplier?"
- Yes
- No
- Hurry up and get their fittings before manufacturing shuts down
- What is water cooling?

I started with EK and have quite a few of their products most of which I managed to get on sale over the years to offset their ultra premium pricing. They do make some interesting products and I hope they clean up their act and become a better company. Having been in a position before where a company ended up falling into a backpay status, without any clarity on the expected duration, it's best just to quit for another opportunity with consistent pay. A company with payroll shenanigan's isn't a company you want to work for in my opinion. It's not worth the stress later when you can't pay your rent/mortgage etc...

 

[Flyordie]

If they show proof they are cleaning up their act then I don't have an extreme issue with it. However, I think their issue is- high interest rates coupled with a garbage CFO/CEO that can't manage money.

Communication is key.

 

[Chaitanya]

We already seem to have lost quite a few makers - Danger Den, Koolance(not sure what their status is these days), Enzotech and none of those seem to have had issues similar to what EK is having.

 

[bonehead123]

If this has been a long-standing, ongoing problem, why hasn't anyone sued them yet, and/or attempted to force them into bankruptcy ?

Seems to me like there is likely a lot more going on behind the scenes than what is covered in that ewwtwoob video, which is usually the case and why I rarely ever watch that garbaggio....

But OTOH:

 

[cvaldes]

Tom's Hardware expands on the GamersNexus report a bit in this article:

EKWB reportedly plagued with financial disarray — many employees and suppliers were allegedly left unpaid for as long as four months

Unpaid bills, drama, and accusations of theft are a recipe for disaster

www.tomshardware.com

In mind it's clear that the company is broken. A fish rots from its head so these financial problems are entirely on the senior management team (starting with the ownership).

They're fumbling massively on multiple fronts, it's not just a little accounting boo-boo. Not paying your employees? Vendors making you prepay? Typically in business there's a 30-day (sometimes 60-day) window so you really have to squander your goodwill to have credit terms revoked. Excess inventory?

Shame, some of their products are attractive (even if the prices are less so these days). But they have stiff competition in a niche market. It takes really good execution to survive in such a tough environment and it looks like they are headed to bankruptcy in the not too distant future.

 

[maxfly]

Jays has a video out about this as well.

 

[A Computer Guy]

Tom's Hardware expands on the GamersNexus report a bit in this article:

EKWB reportedly plagued with financial disarray — many employees and suppliers were allegedly left unpaid for as long as four months

Unpaid bills, drama, and accusations of theft are a recipe for disaster

www.tomshardware.com

In mind it's clear that the company is broken. A fish rots from its head so these financial problems are entirely on the senior management team (starting with the ownership).

They're fumbling massively on multiple fronts, it's not just a little accounting boo-boo. Not paying your employees? Vendors making you prepay? Typically in business there's a 30-day (sometimes 60-day) window so you really have to squander your goodwill to have credit terms revoked. Excess inventory?

Shame, some of their products are attractive (even if the prices are less so these days). But they have stiff competition in a niche market. It takes really good execution to survive in such a tough environment and it looks like they are headed to bankruptcy in the not too distant future.

I guess my fantasy AM5 D5 CPU block res combo is never going to happen now.

 

[gurusmi]

In mind it's clear that the company is broken. A fish rots from its head so these financial problems are entirely on the senior management team (starting with the ownership).

To say it clearly. I'm a freelancer on project business in different branches of the industry based on hour-/daily rates. I always utilitize project firnms in between. It is not unusal for germany and europe that companies pay 2 orr 3 month later. Also they always discuss about the totals. Even if those companies are i.e. Daimler, the big mother of Mercedes, a mother of Airbus etc. They need 3 Month to pay an invoice for a "small freelancer" discussing about every single working hour. Also big banks like the Deutsche Bank, SEB, PNB Paribas,... With that payment attitudes also small companies don't pay in time. That's why Credit insurances exist in germany/Europe. They take a few percentages of the invoice sum and pay out timely. After they take care to get the money from any customer. So the payment attitude is not a sign for bankruptcy at all. But when one don't pay the health insurance for the employees or social security would be a strong sign. They start quite fast with filing bankruptcy cases to the business court.

 

[xtreemchaos]

if something is too much money folks go else where that's EK's problem. i love there kit but hav'nt brought anything new from them for years there prices are crazy.

 

[TechLurker]

I'm surprised that taking on work for EK (and some other brands) is apparently part of how Swiftech hasn't completely died. I wonder if Swiftech also owns their own production line, which allows them to scale as-needed, unlike EK which didn't own most of their production. I wonder who else ended up making some of EK's goods. Maybe Barrow, Blyski, or even Hardware Labs for the radiators? Hardware Labs has definitely been OEM for some of Blyski's early radiators, before Blyski was able to start making them in-house, so it wouldn't surprise me if they might have also been tasked with building some of EK's radiators.

We already seem to have lost quite a few makers - Danger Den, Koolance(not sure what their status is these days), Enzotech and none of those seem to have had issues similar to what EK is having.

Danger Den is the only one dead and gone. Koolance (US and South Korea) and Enzotech (US) survive mostly making liquid-cooling systems for commercial and industrial enterprises, although Enzotech also does some materials production. Same with Cool IT, which still operates in the commercial/industrial/enterprise sector, and used to compete in the AIO market until Asetek managed to force them out with their stupid patent lock; although Cool IT did make some of Corsair's early generation AIOs that had superior performance to the later ones that used Asetek.

Personally, I'd like to see if this would lead to newer review partnerships with other boutique liquid-cooling brands. Blyski and Barrow on the budget end, and Granzon (Blyski's premium line), Singularity Computing, and Optimus PC on the high-end, to name some.

 

[cvaldes]

To say it clearly. I'm a freelancer on project business in different branches of the industry based on hour-/daily rates. I always utilitize project firnms in between. It is not unusal for germany and europe that companies pay 2 orr 3 month later. Also they always discuss about the totals. Even if those companies are i.e. Daimler, the big mother of Mercedes, a mother of Airbus etc. They need 3 Month to pay an invoice for a "small freelancer" discussing about every single working hour. Also big banks like the Deutsche Bank, SEB, PNB Paribas,... With that payment attitudes also small companies don't pay in time. That's why Credit insurances exist in germany/Europe. They take a few percentages of the invoice sum and pay out timely. After they take care to get the money from any customer. So the payment attitude is not a sign for bankruptcy at all. But when one don't pay the health insurance for the employees or social security would be a strong sign. They start quite fast with filing bankruptcy cases to the business court.

Which is why EK seems to be in dire straits.

Their vendors are forcing pre-pay conditions, no more easy credit terms. The fact that they have been late making payroll bonus payments is even more troubling. That sort of thing typically does not generate good employee morale.

Anyhow, there are plenty of tech media sites who have picked up on this sad story and are now covering this.

I don't know how the laws work where EK is but here in the USA, companies are required by law to hold cash for accumulated employee compensation, things like paid vacations that have been earned.

I used to work for an American company that had foreign partners (in about 40 countries worldwide). A couple of those importers were put on the pre-pay list due to previous bad behavior. We wouldn't push their orders off the loading dock until the money was in our bank account. For everyone it was typically order, ship, invoice. I think they had 60-day terms (domestic partners had 30-days).

The most important thing about the EK situation is that the pre-pay condition isn't the only red flag. There are multiple red flags including payroll irregularities, government investigation, and inventory accumulation. If they are also cooking their books and/or lying to shareholders, they will eventually be caught just like SBP, Bernie Madoff, or any other charlatan.

 

[thesmokingman]

Average at best products at Nvidia prices, that's a winning recipe lol.

 

[KrazyT]

Nobody reads the news ?

 

[cvaldes]

Nobody reads the news ?

We did read the news, that's why the OP posted something days before the TPU article came out. Not all news is published at the same moment. In fact so did TPU which is why they had someone write their article several days after GN brought this to everyone's attention.

The Tom's Hardware article followed the GN video, was also published before the TPU article. And there's a Guru3D article as well.

TPU is actually rather late covering this whole topic by waiting until today. I haven't read it, not sure if it has anything enlightening than the Tom's Hardware article (or original GN video).

 

[A Computer Guy]

Interestingly their Intel water blocks are on clearance now. I'm kind of tempted to get one but I don't own a new enough Intel cpu to justify it.

 

[tabascosauz]

Interestingly their Intel water blocks are on clearance now. I'm kind of tempted to get one but I don't own a new enough Intel cpu to justify it.

Not even on clearance would I buy one of their blocks over an Optimus Signature, now that it exists for both AMD and Intel. EK is peak form over function (actually, you know what, money over everything).

Their fittings are decent, and that's about it. For everything else there are so many superior options out there.

 

[cvaldes]

Interestingly their Intel water blocks are on clearance now. I'm kind of tempted to get one but I don't own a new enough Intel cpu to justify it.

If you want something you see available now buy it. There is little chance they will do an additional production run once an Intel CPU waterblock sells out.

Intel changes their socket very frequently so EK carrying a bunch of waterblocks for a discontinued socket isn't wise. In fact, this is one of the factors called out in their troublesome inventory accumulation. The manufacturing partners have minimum orders, it's not like EK can order 3 CPU waterblocks for the three people who inquired via e-mail about an out-of-stock product. Same with GPU waterblocks, they are custom designs for a specific PCB and chip layout.

Things like pumps, radiators, reservoirs, and fittings are pretty interchangeable and don't get obsoleted by the arrival of a new CPU socket or GPU generation.

 

[A Computer Guy]

If you want something you see available now buy it. There is little chance they will do an additional production run once an Intel CPU waterblock sells out.

Intel changes their socket very frequently so EK carrying a bunch of waterblocks for a discontinued socket isn't wise. In fact, this is one of the factors called out in their troublesome inventory accumulation. The manufacturing partners have minimum orders, it's not like EK can order 3 CPU waterblocks for the three people who inquired via e-mail about an out-of-stock product. Same with GPU waterblocks, they are custom designs for a specific PCB and chip layout.

Clearance sale is how I got my AMD Velocity block for only $38. I've been pretty lucky as I've manage to get all my blocks on discount from patiently waiting although I couldn't get Velocity2 with such a deep discount as the first one. A perk of not having the bleeding edge CPU or GPU I suppose.

Things like pumps, radiators, reservoirs, and fittings are pretty interchangeable and don't get obsoleted by the arrival of a new CPU socket or GPU generation.

I already got my Alphacool GPU water block for my RX 6700XT (yet another clearance sale) last year from TitanRig, which was actually for a different model card, but MSI reused PCB and VRM design so I got lucky with a compatible block that others also tried and verified works. Had shelved it for a year so I could get FLT80 on discount too so this summer I have a new project for my NR200P.

 

[maxfly]

Nobody reads the news ?

"EK, the leading computer cooling solutions provider, is launching a special edition direct die water block explicitly engineered for the AMD AM5 socket and delidded Ryzen 7000 CPUs, including the X3D variants."

Their lead in grows more and more hollow by the hour.

TPU hasn't commented on EKs current situation afaik? GN, Jays, Toms and Der Bauer are the only people I've listened to so far. Haven't seen the g3d article yet.

That TPU direct die article is another marketing blurb from EK. Altho, it does a great job of proving the point that EK continues to release overpriced products that won't sell. They're sticking to their guns apparently, create as many wasted SKUs as possible while the ship slowly sinks.

 

[cvaldes]

I thought TPU published some sort of article about EK's troubles but apparently I am wrong, I probably was looking at a different website.

In any case, I'm not sure a TPU article would add anything new to what I've read elsewhere. It's just a sad situation that probably could have been avoided if the EK management was a little more sensible and responsible. Oh well...

 

[KrazyT]

I've pointed out this article because user Arrakis9 posted this GN video on April 20th 2024.
That's all

 

[Chaitanya]

Danger Den is the only one dead and gone. Koolance (US and South Korea) and Enzotech (US) survive mostly making liquid-cooling systems for commercial and industrial enterprises, although Enzotech also does some materials production. Same with Cool IT, which still operates in the commercial/industrial/enterprise sector, and used to compete in the AIO market until Asetek managed to force them out with their stupid patent lock; although Cool IT did make some of Corsair's early generation AIOs that had superior performance to the later ones that used Asetek.

Koolance seems to have cut down on their range and US availability these days compared to 15 years back. CoolIT, Koolance, and Enzotech for all intents and purposes have vanished from consumer space reducing the options available to consumers(even Swiftech seems to have started to vanish in recent days). In case of CoolIT they are OEM for all current Corsair AIOs(Corsair has dumped Asstek for good and moved to CoolIT which is why Asstek had sued them along with CoolIT.) also they have heavily invested into enterprize market while withdrawing from consumer space.

Here is a message posted by EK CEO(after Der8bauer, and Jayz2Cents also posted about their expirience with EKWB).