It may come as a surprise, but Western Digital has just announced that it will stop selling SSDs under its own brand name. This decision is the result of a desire to focus investment and research on its historical core business: mechanical hard drives, a segment that is still profitable and in demand, particularly for data centres and large-scale storage solutions for AI. There’s nothing bizarre about this story, which is really a question of business strategy. SanDisk is taking over the entire production and marketing of SSDs. Western Digital, meanwhile, is concentrating exclusively on hard drives.
As AI accelerates and impacts industries around the world, and as businesses generate and store more data, shipments of HDD exabytes are expected to increase,” said Western Digital CEO Irving Tan.
Western Digital & SanDisk will each occupy a different segment
For those who may have forgotten, the SanDisk brand was acquired by Western Digital in 2016, precisely to help WD move into flash memory and consumer SSDs. For greater visibility and to optimise its valuation, Western Digital has finalised the split of its activities into two specialised entities. One will focus on hard disk drives (HDDs) under the Western Digital brand, while the other will concentrate on SSDs and flash memory under the SanDisk banner. To be even more precise, it should be noted that this strategic choice stems from the failure of discussions with a view to a merger with Kioxia, a Japanese chip manufacturer, at the end of 2023. SK Hynix, a major player in the memory sector and a member of the consortium led by Bain Capital – which owns 56% of Kioxia – vetoed the deal.
Sandisk claims to have 25% of the consumer SSD market, for portable devices and Xbox and PlayStation game consoles. It also produces flash storage for IoT and automotive companies, as well as for data centres and AI computing centres. Sandisk also has a joint venture with Japanese chipmaker Kioxia. Recently, Kioxia and Sandisk unveiled a next-generation 3D flash memory technology with a NAND interface speed of 4.8 Gbit/s.
