Abstract
HDDs are used in a plethora of business applications ranging from PCs,
notebooks, printers and copiers, consumer products such as MP3 music players,
digital video recorders, game consoles, media-rich mobile phones, and home
servers. Every application dictates a different type of HDD, ranging in
capacity from 1GB to 500GB, in physical size from 0.85 inches to 3.5 inches,
featuring a variety of spindle speeds: 3,600-rpm, 4,200-rpm, 5,400-rpm,
7,200-rpm, 10,000-rpm and 15,000-rpm.
Increasing demand for computing and consumer devices is driving demand for
digital data storage and low-cost, high-performance disk drives. We believe
there are a number of key factors driving this demand, including:
- Increased demand for personal computers with high storage capacities
driven by consumer multi-media, broadband and wireless applications, increased
business usage and proliferation of computers in developing economies;
- Increased demand for enterprise storage driven by a broader deployment of
applications which require significant storage capacity, such as enterprise
software, data warehousing, data recovery, and data security operations;
- Increased demand for new consumer electronic applications which require
significant digital data storage capability, including digital video and audio
recorders, video game platforms, emerging high-definition television
applications, and global positioning systems.
Thin-film media, or disks, are enabling components in disk drives. The
technical advances by disk suppliers, along with those of other component
suppliers, have improved the performance and storage capacity of disk drives
and dramatically lowered the cost per GB stored. Disk suppliers help drive
technology innovation in disk drives by increasing storage capacities per
square inch of disk surface, referred to as areal density, and improving
reliability.
Disks are sold primarily to disk drive manufacturers for incorporation into
disk drives. Disk drives, in turn, are sold to computer or consumer appliance
manufacturers that incorporate the disk drives into their systems, or are sold
directly to consumers.
Hard drives have delivered remarkable advances in capacity, reliability and
cost, but until now those advances have been primarily directed at traditional
computing applications. The consumer electronics market is ripe for widespread
implementation of hard drives to boost storage capacity and deliver rapid and
random access to audio, video and gaming content. The different needs of
consumer devices will challenge hard-drive makers to develop innovative
solutions that balance capacity, power consumption, reliability and other
performance issues to best fit the application at an acceptable cost in a
highly competitive industry. Hard drive electronics can play an essential part
in meeting these needs by providing advanced capabilities that offer drive
makers more design options and flexibility in smaller, power efficient chips
and through system-on-a-chip integration.
The relentless migration in consumer electronics toward mobility at a small
form factor indicates that size does matter. New 0.85-inch HDDs, only a
quarter the size of a 1.8-inch hard disk drive and about the size of a postage
stamp, boost the functionality of a new generation of products, including
mobile phones, digital audio players, PDAs, digital still cameras, and
camcorders.
In the fast-growing consumer electronics market such as MP3 and digital video
camcorder, HDDs compete against flash memory. Compared to flash memory, a
1-inch hard drive has greater capacity, lower cost per gigabyte and faster
data transfer rates than flash, whereas flash memory is smaller, lower in
power, and more rugged. Both drives and flash manufacturers keep upping
capacities and lowering prices, as witnessed by Apple Computer' s recent switch
from HDD in the iPod Mini to flash memory in the iPod Nano.
This report focuses on the entire hard disk drive market food chain, analyzing
the markets for hard disk drives, substrates, and thin film heads. Processing
issues in the manufacture of each of these sectors in included and the report
details the CMP and Lithography sectors of thin film head processing. Market
forecasts of all sectors are detailed.
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