Fujitsu Ltd. set out a strategy today that it hopes will propel its hard disk drive business to grow at about three times the pace of the overall market between now and 2008 to place it among the world’s three largest hard disk drive makers.
The Tokyo-based company is hoping to ride on the back of an anticipated increase in demand for hard disk drives for consumer electronics and laptop PCs, said Ichiro Komura, corporate senior vice president of Fujitsu, at a Tokyo news conference.
Fujitsu expects worldwide demand for 2.5-in. mobile PC drives to rise from 8.1 million units in 2005 to 21 million units by 2010. And it estimated the demand for 1.8-in. drives will rise from 1.6 million units to 9 million units over the same period.
The company wants to increase its drive shipments to 5.4 million units in 2008, just over double the 2.6 million drives it shipped in 2005. To achieve that goal, the company plans to focus on the expanding market for 2.5-in. drives for both consumer electronics products and laptop PCs. It will also begin making 2.5-in. drives for servers and enter the 1.8-in.-drive market for laptops and products like portable digital music players.
Demand from consumer electronics makers is likely to play an increasingly important role in the hard disk drive market, Komura said. In 2005, the non-IT market represented about 20% of the overall market. But this is expected to grow to one-third in 2008 and 44% in 2010, according to Fujitsu.
One of the fastest-growing sectors is for 1.8-in. hard disk drives. Such drives are currently used in products such as Apple Computer Inc.’s iPod music player. To break into that market, Fujitsu will work with Cornice Inc. to develop a 1.8-in. drive.
Cornice currently makes 1-in. drives that are used in a range of portable music players and some cell phones. But since it doesn’t have a 1.8-in. drive either, the deal marks an expansion for both companies.
The market for 1.8-in. drives “is exploding right now,” said Camillo Martino, president and CEO of Cornice. “The new Apple iPod volumes are just phenomenal. Companies such as Toshiba and Hitachi are benefiting from that. I think the market will continue to expand very rapidly, and it will create many opportunities for suppliers in the next few years.”
Fujitsu said it hopes to unveil the first product from the joint development, a 120GB drive, sometime between April and September 2007. All sales of the first-generation drive developed under the partnership will be handled by Fujitsu, it said.
