Hitachi To Unveil Disk Hard Drive Plans

Japanese electronics manufacturer, Hitachi, plans to unveil its strategy for competing in the digital disk drive industry and remaining competitive in this volatile industry. Hitachi acquired the disk drive business of IBM, the pioneer and one-time leader in the manufacturing of disk drives. The disk drive is basically a data storage medium that uses magnetic heads to read spinning disks. Hitachi's $2.05 billion deal with IBM in April 2002, which will eventually give Hitachi full ownership of IBM's disk drive division, gives Hitachi management control of the disk drive business today.

Hitachi's new unit, which is based in San Jose, California, reportedly will announce the expansion of the storage capacity of IBM's smallest disk drives. By Fall 2003, Hitachi will reportedly begin selling a one" square disk drive unit containing 4 billion Bytes of data storage, which is four times the capacity of the IBM disk currently. Hitachi's focus for the sale of these drives is likely to manufacturers of small consumer electronics devices, such as portable music devices and digital cameras, to give them the ability to display animation, play movies and use multimedia applications. Hitachi also reportedly will introduce a new line aimed at the automotive market, consisting of 2.5" hard disks with 20 gigabytes of storage. These drives would likely be used in devices such as automobile digital stereos and in-dash navigation systems.