Wednesday, June 07, 2006

Seagate's Hard (Drive) Sell - Forbes.com

Seagate's Hard (Drive) Sell - Forbes.com: "How do you see flash and hard drive competition evolving over time?
[Seagate Technology Chief Executive William Watkins:] My best guess is that you will get a 40 gigabyte drive in 2010 for $80 on flash. I think the same device in a one-inch hard drive will cost you $40 to $50. In a 2.5-inch drive for $50, I suspect you can get 400 gigabytes. I don't see flash being competitive at 40 gigabytes. But I won't be able to do a 20 gigabyte for much cheaper than [the 40 gigabyte drive], while they will be able to do 10 gigs for $40. Anything below 20 gigabytes, they will own.
What you have to get your head around is what is the application set, and how much storage are people going to need in 2010. Our sense, especially with application sets that want to do a lot of streaming video, is that the minimum requirement will be 50 gigs with a more likely minimum at 100 gigs. So, without video, then yeah, 20 gigs will be sufficient. "

No comments: