Back in the day, when the production of hard drives was just beginning to flourish, the products were quite unreliable and the process of making them was not fully established. Often, manufacturers would be faced with delays and shortages, unable to meet order deadlines.
However, one such manufacturer was very successful. Its company had a lot of satisfied clients and the production worked magnificently. Or at least that’s what it said in the official reports. It turned out later that the financial results of the company were mostly fabricated including false statements about orders and shipments made to reduce costs and increase revenues.
One of the things that this company did when they realized they weren’t able to meet order deadlines was shipping bricks instead of hard drives. They did this so they could buy some time before the customer figured it out. When they received the call from the unsatisfied client, the company simply acknowledged the mistake and sent the right equipment. By then, they would have already manufactured the hard drive to be shipped.
This could have continued for quite some time until it was discovered if it weren’t for the layoffs the company did just before Christmas. One former employee that was involved in the fraudulent packaging went to the local newspaper and spoke of those affairs. That’s how the company finally went bankrupt just within a few days after the announcement was made public.