7 Million HDDs Shipped to Support Flash-Based CE Applications in 2009

Are HDDs and flash memory locked in mortal combat, or are these two technologies actually complementary to each other? A free new white paper HDD vs. Flash War Ends – Both Sides Win! released by Coughlin Associates and Objective Analysis, in conjunction with Roger Hoyt, analyzes both markets and their interdependencies.

                                HDD Units & Percent of HDDs
                     Driven by Flash-Based Consumer Applications

(Source: Coughlin Associates & Objective Analysis, 2009)

The white paper finds that 7 million HDDs will be shipped to support flash-based consumer applications in 2009, a number that will grow to 49 million units in 2014. During the same period the percentage of HDDs shipped to support flash-based consumer applications will increase from 1.4% to 4.6% of total projected HDD shipments. The report projects that 59% of total consumer flash demand, or 2.2 exabytes (2,200 petabytes) of flash memory in 2014 would fail to materialize if inexpensive HDD storage were not available to support it.

Backup and online storage of consumer data (user generated as well as commercial content) further increase the amount of hard disk drive storage required to support consumer flash memory applications.

For a free copy of the white paper

The white paper is based upon data in the report: 2009 Digital Storage in Consumer Electronics, available from Coughlin Associates. The white paper shows how many hard disk drives are sold because of digital storage required to support flash memory consumer electronics applications such as digital cameras, camcorders, and music and video players. In addition much of the flash memory sold in consumer electronics applications is directly due to the existence of inexpensive mass storage provided by hard disk drives. The paper makes the case that there is more symbiosis than competition between hard disk drives and flash memory for consumer electronics applications.