WESTERN DIGITAL REVEALS UPCOMING TECHNOLOGY TO ACCESS BIG DATA

At the “Innovating to Fuel the Next Decade of Big Data” event on October 11, Western Digital Corp. (NASDAQ: WDC) announced groundbreaking innovations to create ultra-high-capacity hard drives to meet future Big Data needs with proven data center-level reliability. The event, which was held at the company’s headquarters in Silicon Valley, demonstrated the world’s first HDD using the microwave-assisted magnetic recording (MAMR) and presentations from company executives and the inventor of the MAMR technology, Professor Jimmy Zhu of Carnegie Mellon University. This company also shows technological sophistication micro actuation and Damascene recording head. Western Digital predicts to start distributing high-capacity MAMR HDDs in 2019 for use in various data centers that support Big Data applications in every type of industry.

“As the volume, speed, variety, and longevity of Big Data and Fast Data continue to increase, the next generation of storage technologies is becoming necessary not only to support ever-expanding capacities, but ultimately to help our customers analyze and collect data. insights into our ever-increasing universe of connected data,” said Mike Cordano, president and chief operating officer of Western Digital. “Fundamental advances in MAMR technology will enable Western Digital to address the massive storage needs of tomorrow by redefining the potential density of HDDs and introducing a new class of reliable, high-capacity drives. We have a proven track record of identifying, investing in and delivering state-of-the-art technology that creates new product categories and lets the world realize the new potential of data. Five years ago we introduced HelioSeal®, our helium-based drive technology. Since then, we have distributed more than 20 million helium drives. Such leadership and innovation continues today and we intend to make good use of it in the future.”

MAMR is one of two energy-assisted technologies that Western Digital has developed over the years. The company recently made breakthrough innovations in materials and processes that provide the required reliability and predictable performance, as well as assembly capabilities to accelerate acreage density and cost improvements by an average of 15 percent annually. Developments in energy-assisted technologies, specifically, heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR), presents new materials science and reliability challenges that are not a factor in MAMR. Only MAMR demonstrates a reliability and cost profile that meets the needs of data center operators.

The core of this company’s innovation breakthrough is “spin torque oscillator” which is used to generate a field microwave which increases the ability to record high-density data without compromising reliability. Western Digital’s innovative MAMR technology is expected to deliver more than 4 terabits-per-square over time. With continuous increases in recording density, MAMR promises to enable hard drives with capacities of 40TB or more by 2025, and continue to expand even further in that timeframe.

“This demonstration of Western Digital’s MAMR technology is a significant breakthrough for the hard disk industry,” said John Rydning, research vice president, Hard Disk Drives, IDC. “The commercialization of MAMR technology will pave the way to higher recording densities, and lower cost-per-terabyte drives for enterprise datacenters, video surveillance systems, and users of NAS products.”

Western Digital’s MAMR technology is the latest innovation to significantly increase areal density. The technology builds on a number of the company’s leading innovations. In addition to HelioSeal’s helium-based technology, MAMR is also built on micro actuation and recording head manufacturing of the company. Advanced technology micro actuation Western Digital for data center applications allows hard drives to accurately and reliably position magnetic heads to write and read data at very high densities. Operations head manufacturing the company is the only internal supplier to leverage Damascene processing in an effort to assemble drive heads with the accurate tolerances and complex structures required for reliable and cost-effective recording at very high densities. The Damascene process also provides the ability to embed spin torque oscillator which allows the assembly of MAMR heads. The combination of these technologies provides total cost of ownership (TCO) that is superior across all sizes of cloud and enterprise data centers.

Western Digital’s demonstration of MAMR technology is the latest achievement in the company’s decades of HDD industry leadership, including 7,000 HDD technology patents, the ongoing development of helium-based HDD technology – as demonstrated at the launch of its 14TB enterprise-class drive with technology host-managed shingled magnetic recording The world’s first (SMR) – and a long history in the world’s first multi-desk design.

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