Hard Drives (Global Market)

This article is about the market. For more information on the hard drive device, see Hard drive (magnetic drive, hard drive, HDD)

2024

World's first 32 TB hard drive released

On October 15, 2024, Western Digital announced the release of the world's first 32 TB hard drive using energy-saving perpendicular magnetic recording (ePMR) technology. The drive, called Ultrastar DC HC690 SMR, is made in a 3.5-inch HelioSeal form factor. Read more here.

Introduced the first 32 TB hard drive

In mid-May 2024, Toshiba announced the first 32 TB hard drive. The storage is made using the technology of magnetic recording with heating (HAMR). Read more here.

2023: World hard drive sales collapse to 127 million

At the end of 2023, approximately 127 million hard drives (HDDs) were sold globally. For comparison, in 2022, shipments were estimated at 172 million units. Thus, on an annualized basis, HDD sales collapsed by about a quarter. Such data are given in a study by Coughlin Associates, the results of which were published in early January 2024.

In 2023, world revenues from the supply of hard drives amounted to less than $14 billion. A year earlier, revenue in the corresponding segment reached $20.4 billion. The fall in this indicator was recorded at 32%. The decline in HDD demand is due to excessive purchases of hard drives and storage systems during the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, the difficult macroeconomic situation, high inflation and rising interest rates had a negative impact on the industry, which is why corporate clients slowed down the pace of development of their IT infrastructures. It is estimated that in 2023 the total capacity of all implemented HDDs was a little less than 900 Ebytes.

The study says that the maximum volume of HDD supplies in unit terms was recorded in 2010, when approximately 651 million devices were shipped. In monetary terms, the record was registered in 2012 - about $37 billion.

Analysts say that in 2023 there was a rapid development of artificial intelligence technologies, but this did not save the HDD industry from a sharp drop. According to Dave Raffo, an analyst at Futurum Group, the biggest challenge facing hard drive manufacturers is that their main customers are leading cloud providers including Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure. They can place large orders for a quarter or two and then reduce the volume of purchases.^[1]

2022: 33.4% market decline

In early February 2023, Coughlin Associates released statistics on the global hard drive (HDD) market. According to estimates, in 2022, the supply of drives of this type collapsed almost twice compared to the previous year.

HDD shipments are declining for several reasons. In particular, flash-based solid-state devices (SSDs) continue to gain popularity. It is estimated that HDD and SSD with a capacity of 500 GB are approximately equal in cost. Analysts predict that in 2023, about 96% of all new laptops will be equipped with solid-state drives. In addition, hard drive sales are falling due to a shrinking global PC market amid a difficult macroeconomic environment and high inflation.

According to Coughlin Associates, in 2022 HDD deliveries in unit terms decreased by 33.4% compared to the previous year. In terms of the shipped capacity, the drop was 14.5%. Moreover, the largest decline was recorded in the segment of nearline devices.

If we consider the industry in piece terms, then Seagate in 2022 accounted for about 43% of deliveries. Another 37% of the market took, Western Digital 20% -. Toshiba The total capacity of the supplied hard drives Seagate in 2022 was 539.6 Ebytes, Western Digital solutions - 459 Ebytes, Toshiba devices - 234.7 Ebytes.

According to Trendfocus statistics, sales of HDD manufactured by Seagate in 2022 fell by 43.7%, Western Digital drives - by 43%. Shipping of Toshiba solutions decreased by 39.3% on an annualized basis. In general, the volume of the global hard drive market decreased by 42.5% - to 35-36 million units. Along with the drop in supplies, a decrease in the average cost of drives was recorded. The industry, according to analysts, will begin to recover in the second half of 2023.^[2][3]

According to Trendfocus analysts, the volume of the global hard drive market in 2022 decreased by 40-40.5% and amounted to 35.2-36.4 million devices. At the same time, all market leaders suffered, albeit in different ways. So, WD and Seagate sank about the same, by 40-43%, while Toshiba showed a decline of 38-39%.

Analysts believe that the main reason for the decline in 2022 was a drop in demand in the corporate market for cloud storage, which is still actively using HDD and cannot easily switch to SSD. The fall in the consumer market took place, but was not so strong. Probably simply because HDD sales have sagged here for a long time, experts say.

In addition to considering the general trends in the hard drive market and the indicators of the largest vendors of this type of product, Trendfocus experts also analyzed HDD sales by market segments.

Analysts concluded that the biggest impact on the deterioration in hard drive sales was a crushing drop in demand in the enterprise cloud storage segment. In total, HDD manufacturers have not left 10-11 million drives to the companies employed in it, if compared with the results of 2021.

As for hard drives for desktops and other consumer-grade devices in the 3.5-inch form factor, its decline in sales did not affect so much and only slightly affected the overall picture.

According to Trendfocus, the decline in this segment in relative values ​ ​ did not exceed 9% year-on-year. 3.5-inch suppliers had some hopes for this segment. They expected that by the fourth quarter of 2022, the level of consumer confidence would stop its decline, and the video surveillance equipment market would show significant growth. Unfortunately, the vendors' expectations were not met.

2021:3% drop to 259 million

The volume of the global hard drive market at the end of 2021 amounted to 259 million units, having decreased by 3% compared to 2020. The decline was due to problems with the supply of components, as well as due to a shift in demand towards solid-state drives (SSDs), whose deliveries in 2022 increased by 12.2%. Such data in mid-February 2022 were released by Terndfocus analysts.

According to their estimates, despite the decline in the HDD market in quantitative terms, in terms of the total capacity of the equipment shipped in 2021, there was a tangible rise - by 31.4%, to 1338 Ebait. This was due to an increase in the average HDD capacity by 31.8%, to 713 GB.

Global Hard Drive Sales Fall as Supply Issues Hit

According to the study, in 2020, the onset of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic had a huge impact on most HDD-consuming markets. The sudden and abrupt shift to remote work and online learning has led to a jump in demand from cloud service providers. In 2021, the total volume of HDD shipped for the first time exceeded 1 ZB. The continued expansion of cloud computing and a significant recovery in corporate IT spending have contributed to staggering capacity growth.

Seagate remains the largest manufacturer of hard drives, which in 2021 recorded a market share of about 43%. In second place is Western Digital with a result of 37%. The top three included Toshiba, which accounted for about 20% of HDD sales. Thus, these three companies actually control the entire hard drive market. Equipment supplies from other vendors are so small that Terndfocus chose to round their shares to zero.

According to Terndfocus, which Toshiba cites on its website, the Japanese corporation in 2021 shipped 54.68 million hard drives with a total capacity of 187.24 Ebytes, which is 4% and 61% more than a year ago. In the desktop and consumer electronics segment, Toshiba's shipments increased by 10%, while the entire market showed growth of 2%.

Toshiba also points out that the company in 2021 increased deliveries of the Nearline HDD class by 73% in pieces and 114% in bits, while the entire market showed an increase of 24% and 49%, respectively.

The lion's share of demand in the hard drive market was provided by corporate customers who purchased 69% of all products or 928 Ebytes, and this is the most HDDs delivered in 2019, that is, only two years before the reporting period. According to Trendfocus, released in February 2022, in the coming years, the average annual growth of the hard drive market will be 23% in terms of data, and in the corporate sector it will be 30%.

The volume of the global hard drive market at the end of 2021 amounted to 259 million units, having decreased by 3% compared to 2020

Despite the overall difficulties in supply chains, including only three suppliers, the highly competitive HDD industry has managed to restore gross profit to a target of 30%. In the near future, a decrease in prices for hard drives is not expected - the price will remain the same or rise, as manufacturers in the current environment face increasing costs that consumers will have to cover, the report said in February 2022.

In 2021, manufacturers continued to create technologies designed to increase HDD capacity. An example is the thermomagnetic recording method, which, through high-precision lasers, makes it possible to reduce the size of the magnetic region storing one bit of information. However, this process is still too complicated for mass production.^[4]

2020

The hard drive market shrank by 18.2%, to 260 million units

Deliveries of hard drives on a global scale at the end of 2020 amounted to approximately 260 million units. This is 18.2% less than a year earlier. This is evidenced by data from analysts at Techno System Research, which were released in August 2021.

According to the study, three companies actually control the entire HDD market: Seagate Technology, Western Digital and Toshiba. Seagate's share in 2020 reached 42.7%, an increase of 2.1 percentage points from the previous year. Western Digital during this time grew by 1.1 percentage points, to 37%. Toshiba has recorded 20.3% of the global hard drive market.

Seagate took first place in HDD deliveries in terms of total storage capacity, but the gap from Western Digital in this case turned out to be insignificant. In 2020, Seagate released HDD with a total capacity of 481.7 Ebytes versus 480 Ebytes from Western Digital. Under the Western Digital brand, drives with a total capacity of 116.06 Ebytes were sold.

The largest category of hard drives in 2020 was products for consumer electronics, the deliveries of which in January-December exceeded 60.3 million units. The second most popular was laptop solutions, which accounted for 57.8 million devices released. Shipments of Near Line equipment reached 57.8 million units, models for desktops - 39.1 million units.

[[File:Screenshot 2021-08-09 in 15.45.30.png

Sales of hard drives in 2020 sank largely due to the consequences of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, in which the main demand in the personal computer market shifted towards laptops, and the desktop segment was in decline.

Another reason for the decline in HDD sales is the development of solid state drives (SSDs). The trend is especially strong in the segment of personal computers, but data centers are increasingly making a choice in favor of "solid-state workers."

For example, after switching to solid-state drives in the data center of KIO Networks, a cloud technology company, the amount of electricity consumed decreased by 60% (for each rack in which the devices were replaced).

Another advantage of SSDs for data centers is performance. For example, the transport company ALC, according to its own data, solid-state devices helped increase storage performance by 40 times compared to hard drives.

Leaders in the hard drive market in 2020

The idea of ​ ​ replacing hard drives with "solid-state drives" is also supported by large technology companies. According to Wayne Allen, Head of Storage for Intel Data Center, HDD is the "last century." They take up too much space and are less reliable compared to SSDs. If for solid-state drives the failure rate is 0.5%, then for hard drives this figure is 2-5%, he said.

All classes of consumer 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch HDDs were affected by the combination of negative factors aggravated by the pandemic. To this should be added the planned by Sony and Microsoft to abandon hard drives in the latest game consoles in favor of SSDs. Without this, both companies would start purchasing or placing orders for hard drives for the upcoming Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 consoles. This market will no longer stimulate the development of HDD, analysts say.

The study notes that the supply of hard drives in capacitive terms in 2020 for the first time exceeded 1 ZB. According to experts, by 2026 the total capacity of the sold drives will triple largely due to the rise in demand for Near Line technologies.

As for HDD, depending on the size, 3.5-inch products were in the lead in 2020, the deliveries of which were measured at 138.8 million units. The release of 2.5-inch drives amounted to 121.8 million copies.^[5]

SSD segment outperforms HDD segment in pieces by 28% (333.12 million SSD devices) - TrendFocus

Solid-State Drives for the first time they were ahead of hard drives in terms of deliveries in physical terms. This happened in 2020, according to data from TrendFocus analysts. According to experts, in 2020, manufacturers around the world shipped 333.12 million SSD devices, which is 20.8% less compared to 2019. At the same time, output HDD in comparison with the same periods decreased by 18%, to 259.81 million units. Thus, the SSD segment was 28% ahead of the HDD segment in pieces. More. here

2019: Market size - $32.5 billion (Future Market Insight data)

The volume of the global hard drive market in 2019 reached $32.5 billion, according to research company Future Market Insight. Analysts did not indicate the dynamics relative to 2018 and only noted that sales of such drives are increasing in money due to several factors, including:

• low HDD price;
• reliability of equipment;
• the growing proliferation of smart devices and social networks, which keeps the demand for storage tools high.

North America remained the largest HDD market in 2019, Europe was in second place. The greatest demand among consumers is for hard drives with a capacity of 250 GB to 1 TB. Network solutions (NAS) are sold better than devices for desktops and laptops, accounting for about two-thirds of hard drive sales in 2019.

Despite the rapid growth in the number of SSDs in the corporate market, shipments of NAS-class hard drives continue to increase rapidly. At the same time, key players such as Seagate are introducing new technologies to increase storage density and device capacity.

According to analysts, the HDD segment for desktop computers is experiencing a qualitative jump, despite the relatively low market share of this equipment in monetary terms.

In the struggle between themselves, manufacturers focused on HDD characteristics such as portability, capacity and physical dimensions. In addition, increased attention is paid to the environmental component, so helium devices are gaining popularity, for example.^[6]

The most popular interfaces in hard drives in 2019, data from Future Market Insight

As for the most demanded interfaces for connecting HDD to computers, USB 3.0 took first place in 2019. The second position was taken by models with USB 2.0 support, and the top three segments were closed by devices equipped with USB 3.1 Gen 1 connectors.

2016: Market Falls Over 6 Years

In early March 2017, the industry organization IDEMA (International Disk Drive Equipment and Materials Association) published some calculations from a study of the hard drive market. Its volume, as it turned out, has been declining for six years in a row. Moreover, the negative dynamics may continue in the future, reports the Taiwanese information portal DigiTimes.

According to IDEMA, HDD shipments worldwide totaled 425.8 million in 2016, down 9.2% from the previous year. The market has been falling since 2010, when shipments of devices were record and measured at 651.4 million units. Experts expect that in 2017 the production of computer hard drives will decrease to 407.7 million units.

Production of HDD at Seagate plant

The IDEMA report notes that HDD sales are decreasing in physical terms, but the average storage capacity is increasing. In 2015, the total capacity of hard drives delivered to the global market was 535.8 Ebytes, and a year later it increased to 633 Ebytes. In 2017, the figure is expected at 768 Ebait.

According to the industry organization, by the beginning of 2017, the production of 1.8-inch hard drives was almost completely completed. Sales of 2.5-inch laptop devices and 3.5-inch devices are declining.

The demand is growing only for HDDs such as Nearline, as evidenced by the growing sales of network-attached data storage storage devices (NAS) by private users and the small and medium-sized business segment.

By early 2017, only four manufacturers remained in the hard drive market: Seagate, Western Digital, Toshiba and HGST. Moreover, the latter, which was previously the business of Hitachi, is part of Western Digital, so in fact we are talking about only three vendors.^[7]

2012

While hard drive shipments () HDD are beginning to recover gradually, inventory will not return to normal until the third quarter of 2012, and prices for this type of electronic component will remain unusually high for the next two years to 2014 inclusive, according to a study (Coughlin Associates February 2012).

As a result of the floods in Thailand, prices in the global HDD market will increase by 20-30% from the average of the previous level during 2012, analysts predict. In addition, the costs of manufacturers to restore their capacities in the affected Asian country will total about $1 billion. In addition, the consolidation of the industry also affects the rise in prices, analysts say.

Nevertheless, there are positive aspects in price increases, the report says: for example, it will contribute to the transition to new and more expensive technologies in 2015-2016 and an increase in disk density by 40%. Despite the fact that in recent years the average annual increase in HDD density has gradually slowed down, the HDD capacity continues to increase. The 12TB 3.5-inch HDD and 6TB 2.5-inch HDD are due in 2016. Due to slow growth, density over the next two years, users will have to pay more for each gigabyte of storage capacity.

HDD shipments fell 26% in the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to the same period in 2010, according to IHS iSuppli. In the first quarter of 2012, according to forecasts, they will decrease by another 13% in annual terms, and in the second quarter of 2012 - by 5%.

Researchers at IHS iSuppli point out that the average global HDD price increased by 28% in the fourth quarter of 2011. In the first quarter of 2012, this figure will decrease by 3%, in the second - by 9%, but in general it will remain high throughout the year.

Flooding in Thailand is forecast by IHS iSuppli to continue to have an impact on the market until supplies finally recover. First, by 2% in the third quarter of 2012, and then by 42% in the fourth quarter of 2012. The balance between supply and demand in this market will recover by the third quarter of 2012, analysts at IHS iSuppli say.

2011

Thailand floods have no major impact on market

Powerful floods in Thailand will not have a significant impact on PC sales for this pre-holiday season, research firm IDC said.

The effect of the disaster is not expected to affect the production of personal computers until early next year. In the worst case scenario, PC shipments could fall more than a 20% from previous forecasts for the first quarter of 2012.

IDC reported on Thursday a low level of flood impact on holiday sales: personal computers that will be sold during the holidays have already been assembled or will be equipped with previously received spare parts and hard drives, thereby reducing supply disruptions due to flooding. It is expected that PC deliveries in the October-December quarter will be less than 10% lower than the preliminary forecast due to problems with the supply of hard drives.

Computer manufacturers, companies supplying hard drives, and manufacturers of their components have prepared for trouble. Many of Thailand's hard-drive plants are temporarily closed as floods have been flooding little by little since August. Prices for hard drives jumped, and PC manufacturers such as Dell and Apple controlled their stocks.

John Rydning, IDC vice president of research for the hard drive and semiconductor market, said major manufacturers are likely to be the first to receive the hard drive components that are available. But another IDC analyst, Laurent Loverde, believes that even the largest manufacturers will face shortages.

IDC notes that Thailand accounted for up to 45% of global hard drive production in the first half of the year. The company estimates that nearly half of these capacities were affected by flooding as of early November 2011.

Cisco Systems said Wednesday that it has watched the current situation affect the disks for its set-top boxes and network optics products. According to the company, it has contingency plans to minimize any impact. It takes into account forecasts, but expects that the situation will not return to normal for several more quarters.

Recall that Thailand ranks first in the world in the production of components for hard drives. In addition, a quarter of the world's assembly capacities are concentrated in this country - the factories of the main market participants are located here: Western Digital, Toshiba, Seagate Technology and Hitachi GST.

Analysts expected that the consequences of the flood in Thailand would affect the price of hard drives, on average, adding up to 10% in the fourth quarter of 2011. In Russia, according to the Yandex.Market online service, average retail prices for some popular hard drive models jumped 2-3 times during October.

Thai flood puts 30% of hard drive factories out of commission

The Thai flood of 2011 put 30% of manufacturing factories out of commission, hard drives so very soon these devices will be in serious shortage. PC manufacturers, who were so severely affected by the earthquake and tsunami in, Japan are experiencing depressed moods.

The personal computer industry, already depressed, could take another big hit. Massive flooding in Thailand could disrupt the production of critical components - storage disks.

Enterprises that produce a third of the hard drives produced in the country have already been temporarily closed, as the flood gradually spreads since August 2011. Prices have risen, and Apple has already said that the current situation will affect the production of Mac computers.

Computer manufacturers, hard drive vendors, and component manufacturers for these drives have faced significant challenges. It is not yet clear how much the PC production chain will suffer in the end, as well as whether the manufacturers themselves will pay off all costs or pass them on to customers.

Thailand produces about 25% of all hard drives in the world, the second largest manufacturer after China, according to IHS ISuppli. Research firm IDC said the flooding affected 30% of Thailand's production capacity, the equivalent of 120 million token discs a year. Hard drive prices rose by a few dollars.

Photo: Associated Press
Workers at a factory in Thailand try to build a barrier from sandbags in an industrial area on the outskirts of Bangkok

The victims of the flood in Thailand at the end of October 2011 were 317 people. About 9 million people were forced to leave their homes. The economic damage from the flood is estimated at $3 billion, this figure is constantly growing.

The largest hard drive manufacturers - Seagate Technology PLC and Western Digital Corp - have warned of supply delays. Western Digital suspended operations in Thailand, with floods affecting two of that company's factories, which were closed.

The company's production facilities in Malaysia, fortunately, are operating in full. However, Western Digital said it would struggle to meet demand until the end of 2011. In the fourth quarter of the 2010-2011 fiscal year ended July 1, 2011, Western Digital delivered 54 million hard drives to the global market, of which 60% left the conveyors of Thai factories (the rest 40% launched in Malaysia). Shares of the company are already down 15%.

Seagate said its Thailand plants were still operating, but the company was already having trouble getting some components. Toshiba also suspended all hard drive operations in Thailand.

PC manufacturers are seriously concerned about the situation. Apple CEO Tim' Cook noted that the shortage of hard drives will most likely begin. Mac production will be most affected, as smartphones and tablets use a different type of memory, he said. Dell and HP said they are still in control.

• Information about the consequences of the flood resembles reports from the front. On October 12, 2011, Western Digital announced the closure of factories, noting that it could not yet assess the scale of the consequences. Just 5 days later, on October 17, a new message was published in which the company stated that "a significant blow to the activities and ability of flooding in Thailand" flooded "the hard drive market: prices for hard drives are rising sharply].</ref>

Another 2 days later, on October 19, in a conversation with investors, WD CEO John Coyne said that the shortage of Winchesters caused by the flood in Thailand will last until 2012, and that the increase in prices for devices is "inevitable." The company added that, taking into account downtime in the IV calendar quarter of 2011, they will be able to supply no more than 22-26 million drives.

Seagate was not as affected by the disaster as a competitor. An official release posted on October 12 said the factories had not been affected and employees were not experiencing any difficulties visiting workplaces. However, as a result of the damaged infrastructure, Seagate faced disruptions in the supply of hard drive parts.

On October 20, the vendor announced that its factories in Thailand continue to produce hard drives in the same volume, and in the IV quarter it is planned to supply 40-50 million devices, twice as much as Western Digital's forecast (which could lead to a reverse change of leader). Seagate news very pleased exchange analysts - after them the company's shares rose immediately by 8%.

The closure of winchester factories in the province of Pathum Thani (also near Bangkok) was announced. Toshiba The company said that the water level in them reaches 1 meter. Now the factories are standing, and employees are waiting at home. The hard drive manufacturer expects to return to its previous production volumes no earlier than in early 2012.

Hitachi's third-largest vendor GST said its factories were not affected by the disaster. Recall that WD is currently awaiting regulatory approval to purchase Hitachi's hard drive division.

Thailand produces a quarter of the world's hard drive capacity, according to IHS iSuppli, and the state has the second largest output after China. The flood affected a third of the production capacity for the production of hard drives in Thailand, which is equivalent to more than 120 million devices produced per year, adds IDC. In total, as a result of a natural disaster, according to IHS iSuppli, in the IV quarter of 2011, about 30% less hard drives will be delivered to the market.

At the end of October, a sharp increase in the cost of hard drives is recorded. So, according to the PriceGrabber website, in recent weeks the growth corresponds to most of the assortment positions. However, information on how much prices have increased is different. For example, DigiTimes says 5-10 percent growth, and experts from IHS iSuppli in some cases note a 50 percent increase in the cost of devices over the past week and a half.

A hard drive is an essential part of a modern PC, be it a desktop system or a laptop. Therefore, their shortage will directly affect the personal computer market.

One of the first to warn Apple CEO Tim Cook about possible problems with the supply of computing systems. However, he could not accurately name the scale of the consequences. In turn, Dell expects minimal damage, and HP has so far refrained from commenting, stating that it is monitoring the situation.

More optimistic sentiments are observed in processor suppliers. According to the CFO of Intel Stacy J. Smith (Stacy Smith), PC manufacturers will be able to fill the shortage of magnetic drives by accumulating inventory and switching orders to existing factories. Therefore, Intel, whose processors cost about 80% of the world's computers, does not expect a decline in PC sales at the end of 2011.

Intel's point of view is supported by AMD. "We talked to our customers, and they informed us that they do not expect serious consequences in the IV quarter of 2011. Vendors expect that they will have enough current stocks," said AMD CFO Thomas Seifert.

Analyst John Rydning from IDC believes that the industry is not in danger of any serious problems as a result of the flood, as the hard drive market is characterized by "extremely high flexibility and excessive strength." The expert argues that after the March 2011 earthquake in Japan, as a result of which the infrastructure was also destroyed, vendors quickly restored the previous volumes of electronics supplies.

In any case, consumers will have to pay for what happened. Last Friday, October 28, Acer, the fourth largest supplier of PCs, warned that in the IV quarter of 2011, its sales will be reduced by 10% as a result of flooding in Thailand. Representatives of the company said that the cost of hard drives in industrial parties increased by about 20%, which in the end will have to compensate customers.

According to observers, problems with the supply of hard drives can give rise to flash memory, as an alternative non-volatile storage medium. However, players in this market are unlikely to have the opportunity to expand production facilities to such sizes as to satisfy the lack of supply, writes The Register.

At this time, it was assumed that the mass transition to flash memory was unlikely to take place. To date, no major vendor has expressed a desire to change hard drives to microcircuits. Nevertheless, in the absence of the required number of hard drives, manufacturers will still have to at least partially compensate for the lack of flash memory drives, and the analytical company inSpectrum already predicts an increase in prices for it.

As of fall 2011, Thailand produces about 25% of all hard drives in the world, the second largest manufacturer after China, according to IHS ISuppli.

In 2011, the main consumer of hard drives - the PC industry is experiencing serious problems. Demand for PCs is declining, especially in the United States and Europe due to domestic economic problems, unemployment and the growing popularity of tablets.

2010

Supply Volume Leaders

In the 1st quarter of 2010, Seagate Technology, formerly the world's largest manufacturer of hard drives, lost this position to Western Digital, iSuppli reports. In the period from January to March, Western Digital delivered a record number of magnetic drives - 51.1 million units. Compared to the 4th quarter of 2009 (49.5 million), this figure increased by 3.2%. For comparison, Seagate deliveries in the same period amounted to 50.3 million hard drives, which is 0.8% more compared to 49.9 million devices delivered to the market in the previous quarter.

The third largest vendor is Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, which recently presented the most capacious hard drives in the industry with a case height of 7 mm. Toshiba Fujitsu also shared the fourth place in terms of delivery volumes Samsung , and took fifth place. The composition of the five did not change compared to the 4th quarter of 2009, but the results were contrasting. In addition to WD and Seagate, only Hitachi GST showed positive dynamics, which increased deliveries by 13.9%, exceeding the indicators of market leaders.

Top earners

Despite the fact that WD was able to outperform its competitor in terms of supply, Seagate still leads in terms of revenue, and by a more clear margin. Seagate's revenue in the 1st quarter of this year amounted to $3.1 billion, while Western Digital - $2.64 billion. According to analysts, the fact that Seagate's revenue is more due to the large volume of HDD deliveries of the upper price range to the corporate segment. WD, on the other hand, concentrates on the supply of cheaper corporate solutions that reduce the average selling value, but allow you to increase the volume of supplies.

Investments

In addition to changes in the balance of power, analysts note an increase in capital investment in 2010. So, recently Western Digital announced its intention to invest about $1.2 billion in the expansion of factories in Malaysia over the next 5 years. This is in addition to the other $650-750 million that is planned to be spent this year. According to analysts, in the future the competition between this manufacturer and Seagate will become even more acute.

In December 2009, Seagate introduced its first solid state drive (SSD), joining other players in the latter market. According to Gartner, twice as many SSDs will be sold in 2010 compared to 2009, and the market size in monetary terms will reach $1 billion. Analysts also say that over time, SSDs will be able to seriously compete with hard drives and, ultimately, replace them. SSDs offer higher mechanical reliability and lower power consumption, but at the moment significantly higher cost.

1985:20 Megabyte Portable Drive

20 megabyte portable drive, USA, 1985.

1980: 10MB drive price - $3.495

10 MB hard drive, $3.495 price. July 1980.

1979

250 megabyte hard drive, 1979, USA

1956: One of the first hard drives

One of the first hard drives. Volume 5 mb. Released in 1956

See also

• Hard Drives (Russian Market)
• Solid-state drives - SSD (Russian market)
• SSD - SSD (Global Market)

Notes