Remaining PC inventory from recently bankrupt PC maker Artesian Builds will be auctioned off tomorrow, including large lots of motherboards, RAM kits, fans, partially built PCs, coolers, CPUs and even a range of graphics cards.
Two lots of PC parts from the company’s locations in California and North Carolina will be sold to the highest bidder via Zoom. Each lot will be sold as a combined purchase, requiring new bids to be placed in increments of $5,000 or more. That means your average PC maker is likely to fall out of the loop. However, other PC makers may well be interested in the supply as the two lots contain pretty much everything they would need to build a PC a lot of of machines.
Such as:
- 43 partially built PCs
- 413 cases
- 360 CPUs
- 359 power supplies
- 219 RAM kits
- 283 cooler
- 167 SSD + HDD
- 59 graphics cards
- 346 motherboards
Also included in the sale are office supplies and various tools that would have once served Artesian Builds’ approximately 50 employees. This equipment can be seen in the various images of the company’s two locations included in the sale’s legal notice, most of which appear to have been left as they were in the company’s final days of operation.
Artesian Builds is said to have held around $917,595 worth of inventory at the time of its closure, so you’d expect large sums of money to be exchanged for the leftover goods at the auction.
However, it’s not just inventory that has been at a standstill since the company closed. Many customer orders are said to have remained open due to the sudden closure. On its final balance sheet, filed as part of a California bankruptcy filing, the company is listed with an estimated $1.37 million in unfulfilled orders.
Artesian Builds is reported to have held approximately $917,595 worth of inventory at the time of its closure.
A former employee told us at the time that at least “hundreds” of gaming PC orders were pending. Some customers also reported having little luck with the company’s compensation, including a customer whose son ordered a $5,100 PC in December 2021. They eventually filed a dispute with their credit card company and allegedly bought a PC elsewhere that other customers have made on the Artesian Builds Discord server.
Pictured above: Leftover inventory from Artesian Builds North Carolina location.
In the photos of the two lots you can see baskets of PC parts waiting to be built when Artesian Builds finally closed. There are even half-built PCs with labels indicating how close they were to completion.
A third lot will also be auctioned, although they are not other PC parts. This lot includes Artesian Builds name, domain, client list, influencer list, registered trademarks and an account in his name. Theoretically, this could result in another company taking the Artesian Builds name and resuming operations, but given the potential negative connotations with the defunct brand, I don’t expect that to happen.
A business is more likely to find a use for the contacts included in Lot 3, which contain details of customers from the last three years and many influencers. This information mostly includes e-mail addresses, but some postal addresses are recorded.
Oh, you thought your data would be wiped out once a company went under? nope
Customer information will be treated “subject to the appointment and review of a consumer data ombudsman”. That means anyone who buys it might have to jump through some hurdles to actually put that data to any good use, although it appears the influencer data is fair game.
Shown below: Leftover inventory from Artesian Builds California location.
Artesian Builds filed for bankruptcy (opens in new tab) in April this year after a controversial sweepstakes live stream (opens in new tab) by company owner and CEO, Noah Katz. This may have played a role in the company’s sudden closure, although former employees, who spoke to PC Gamer on condition of anonymity, suggested Katz’s inexperience as CEO may have led to his eventual failure.
These latest lots are an attempt by Artesian Build’s creditors to recover some of their lost money from the defunct business. These debts are paid in order of importance, from secured creditors to unsecured creditors. Employees at the time of business closure may end up as preferred creditors, who are somewhere in the middle of the stack, meaning they receive their outstanding dues after secured creditors are paid off. Customers may be able to register as unsecured creditors, which is at the bottom of the refund order.
If a company cannot afford to use its assets and holdings to pay off its debts to its secured creditors such as banks, there may be no money left for customers to claim compensation for what they have stated. Unfortunately, it’s not yet clear what the outcome will be for any customers still awaiting money from Artesian Build’s bankruptcy proceedings.