In brief: Tan said Razer intends to donate up to one million masks to healthcare authorities around the globe. The first batch will go out to facilities in Singapore. The company's global and regional offices will be reaching out to local governments and health authorities to help distribute additional supplies, we're told.
Gaming hardware and accessory maker Razer is diverting some of its manufacturing resources to help with the coronavirus pandemic.
Razer CEO Min-Liang Tan in a series of tweets posted earlier today said that over the past few days, their designers and engineers have been working around the clock to convert some of their existing manufacturing lines to produce surgical masks to help with global shortages.
All of us have a part to play and we should be doing whatever we can with the situation getting more serious. Please keep yourself and your family safe - and do lets support each other in these trying times. The team at Razer is stepping up to do what we can.
--- Min-Liang Tan (@minliangtan) March 19, 2020
It's the "first step of many" that Razer is planning to take to combat the virus, Tan added.
Details of the masks weren't mentioned. In order to carry the N95 designation, masks must meet guidelines outlined by the Code of Federal Regulations.
The World Health Organization said earlier this month that based on its modeling, an estimated 89 million medical masks will be needed for Covid-19 response each month. To meet those demands, WHO said manufacturing must increase by 40 percent.
Razer isn't the only tech giant to divert manufacturing lines to help with the cause. It was revealed late last month that Japanese electronics giant Sharp was planning to produce as many as 150,000 masks per day by mid-March. Foxconn also built its own production line for surgical masks in hopes of getting general manufacturing efforts back online faster.