Thursday, October 2nd 2008

Fujitsu to Sell its Unprofitable Hard Drive Business to Western Digital

A new rumour is spreading around the net, claiming that Fujitsu is in talks with WesternDigital to sell its hard disk drive business. Currently WD is the second-largest hard disk drive maker in the world behind Seagate Technology. Fujitsu's HDD business is ranked sixth. If there's a deal between WD and Fujitsu, it would raise WesternDigital's market share to almost the same level as the market leader Seagate Technology. A possible acquisition would include Fujitsu's plants in Japan, the Philippines and Thailand with a total of 15,000 workers.
It's necessary for Fujitsu to review its disk-drive operations because it's facing severe competition in an industry that requires large commitments to capital spending for companies to be competitive,
said Yukihiko Shimada, an analyst at Mitsubishi UFJ Securities Co. The deal would be finalized by the end of the year, according to experts. WD and Fujitsu representatives declined to make any official statements and confirm the story.
Source: CNET News
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12 Comments on Fujitsu to Sell its Unprofitable Hard Drive Business to Western Digital

#1
Mussels
Freshwater Moderator
Thats interesting. I've never had any real experience with fujitsu drives, but WD certainly has the market share to use fuji's production facilities and workers.
Posted on Reply
#2
Homeless
I'm surprised they aren't profitable as I thought they sold to the majority of laptop OEM's
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#3
FreedomEclipse
~Technological Technocrat~
HomelessI'm surprised they aren't profitable as I thought they sold to the majority of laptop OEM's
Agreed. they make they own laptops & desktops - wouldnt it make sense to bundle it with one of your own hard drives instead of having to buy from another manufacturer to keep costs down??? - W.D theoretically stands to gain nothing from this transaction as they already make hard drives.
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#4
Darkrealms
FreedomEclipseAgreed. they make they own laptops & desktops - wouldnt it make sense to bundle it with one of your own hard drives instead of having to buy from another manufacturer to keep costs down??? - W.D theoretically stands to gain nothing from this transaction as they already make hard drives.
More market share with whatever Fujitsu had. Possibly a few patents and R&D concepts. Also as mentioned above manufacturing plants and personel.

Maybe even a contract with Fujitsu to supply all their drives?
Posted on Reply
#5
AsRock
TPU addict
MusselsThats interesting. I've never had any real experience with Fujitsu drives, but WD certainly has the market share to use fuji's production facilities and workers.
I did some years ago and never touched them again and went back to WD drives. All though they MAYBE better today.


EDIT:If i remember right Fujitsu took over Quantum far few years ago. I had loads of trust in Quantum till that happened.
Posted on Reply
#6
thebeephaha
I thought maxtor bought quantum, seeing as I have maxtor drives that have quantum labels on them...

Anyways, Fujitsu laptop drives are iffy at best in my experience, however, they make some nice SCSI and SAS drives.
Posted on Reply
#7
AsRock
TPU addict
thebeephahaI thought maxtor bought quantum, seeing as I have maxtor drives that have quantum labels on them...

Anyways, Fujitsu laptop drives are iffy at best in my experience, however, they make some nice SCSI and SAS drives.
I guess Maxtor did then, when i heard this was around 2000\1 Funny though i don't like Maxtor drives either.

So Maxtor acquired Quantum and Seagate acquired Maxtor ?. Sheesh what a world we live in lol.
Posted on Reply
#8
TheGuruStud
Quantum was bigger junk than maxtor. The fireball series from quantum was a literal *poof*. Maxtors just decided to instantly die very quick.

Seagate...no recent experience, but I know the super old ones never die (neither do the ancient WDs).
I wonder if seagate just closed down all of maxtor's manuf. It was such junk, I don't think they could've used it.

And on WD, I use them exclusively. Buy a good series (they've had bad batches as of late) and you'll most likely never have a failure for many years (unless you abuse it with high heat).

I run mine 24/7 with heavy use (lots of large archive stuff, defragging with O&O, multiple operations at a time, etc) and couldn't be more
pleased.

All I see in laptops are fujitsu and toshiba drives, but they do die a lot. But most of that can be attributed to high heat. 55+ C isn't good haha (stupid ass laptop manuf).
Posted on Reply
#9
AsRock
TPU addict
TheGuruStudQuantum was bigger junk than maxtor. The fireball series from quantum was a literal *poof*. Maxtors just decided to instantly die very quick.

Seagate...no recent experience, but I know the super old ones never die (neither do the ancient WDs).
I wonder if seagate just closed down all of maxtor's manuf. It was such junk, I don't think they could've used it.

And on WD, I use them exclusively. Buy a good series (they've had bad batches as of late) and you'll most likely never have a failure for many years (unless you abuse it with high heat).

I run mine 24/7 with heavy use (lots of large archive stuff, defragging with O&O, multiple operations at a time, etc) and couldn't be more
pleased.

All I see in laptops are fujitsu and toshiba drives, but they do die a lot. But most of that can be attributed to high heat. 55+ C isn't good haha (stupid ass laptop manuf).
Well i am going by my own experience as i was running a few 3GB Fireballs drives on a Adaptec 2940 without issues for years..

I have a few Seagates still today working ones in the MB's others are 6GB+( maybe smaller) all though got bad blocks on them.
Posted on Reply
#10
TheGuruStud
AsRockWell i am going by my own experience as i was running a few 3GB Fireballs drives on a Adaptec 2940 without issues for years..

I have a few Seagates still today working ones in the MB's others are 6GB+( maybe smaller) all though got bad blocks on them.
LOL, 3 GB. I'm remembering the 8 gigs. Repair shops would have dozens just piled up.
Posted on Reply
#11
AsRock
TPU addict
TheGuruStudLOL, 3 GB. I'm remembering the 8 gigs. Repair shops would have dozens just piled up.
Maybe they got worse ?.. If i remember correctly they were actually 3.2GB Cost me a bomb too back then with them being SCSI.

If i can find my old seagate i'll post a pic for giggles lol. My belovid mother thought i would still need it and could not been any more wrong lol.. She never brought my Fireball HDD's or my 2940 over have a feeling my bro did some thing with those :(.
Posted on Reply
#12
Darkrealms
LoL, I think I have 12 9Gb Quantums (I think) lying around.
Posted on Reply
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