78.6 Million HDDs Shipped WW in 2CQ19, Up 1.2% Q/Q in Slight Progression – Trenfocus

This SDAS: HDD Information Service from Trendfocus, Inc., Q2’19 Quarterly Update-Executive Summary, was written on August 2, 2019

CQ2 HDD Ships Over 207EB, Unit Shipments Inch Up 1% to 78.6 Million
Nearline units/exabytes rise 13%/19%, respectively on renewed cloud/hyperscale demand

HDD Supplier Summary, 2CQ9, Units in Million

Seagate‘s HDD unit shipments held nearly flat Q/Q at 31.39 million while capacity shipped rose 10% over the same period to 84.04EBs. Rising SSD attach rates combined with lower seasonal PC and branded HDD sales, offsetting some PC build-ahead on fears of rising tariffs to drive both desktop and mobile HDDs lower sequentially. 6.92 million desktop HDDs and 8.63 million mobile HDDs slipped 2.5% and 14%, respectively on a Q/Q basis. Seasonal gaming purchases and a trade-tension driven sell-ahead of surveillance HDDs lifted total CE HDD shipments by 17% from the prior quarter to 8.49 million units. 2.5″ enterprise HDDs dropped 3% to 2.46 million units as nearline units jumped 11% to 4.89 million HDDs, while nearline capacity rose 18% to 37.39EBs.

Toshiba‘s total HDD shipments rose 5% sequentially to 19.43 million units while capacity shipped of 27.01EB represented an 8% rise over the period. Desktop HDDs fell 9% to 2.47 million units while mobile HDDs posted the only Q/Q industry rise of almost 1% to 7.43 million HDDs. CE HDD shipments benefited from a seasonal game console demand increase and may have also been affected by some pull-in due to potential trade tensions. Total CE HDDs rose 23% Q/Q to 6.68 million units. 2.5″ enterprise HDDs fell nearly 10% Q/Q to 1.42 million, pointing to both slowing corporate system purchases and a longer-term impact from SSD displacement. The company’s nearline HDDs, on the other hand, rose 4% in sequential units shipped to 1.43 million HDDs while capacity shipped jumped a sharp 20% to 9.77EB.

Western Digital‘s nearly flat sequential HDD shipments of 27.74 million units also represented a sharp rise in capacity shipped of 11% to 96.42EB. Like the other suppliers, the company felt the impacts of global trade tensions affecting desktop and mobile HDD shipments; however, the company’s desktop HDDs rose a slight 3% Q/Q to 6.53 million units while mobile HDDs fell over 9% to 10.07 million HDDs. With Western Digital no longer shipping HDDs to game consoles, 2.5″ CE HDDs fell 15% Q/Q while the pull-in of surveillance HDD shipments helped to lift total CE shipments to 4.95 million units in CQ2, or a 3% Q/Q rise. The company’s exit from the 2.5″ enterprise market drove down shipments to a sparse 0.11 million HDDs, while nearline shipments surged 17% in units and 19% in capacity shipped to 6.08 million units and 58.56EB as the company ramped up sales of its 14TB nearline HDD to cloud customers.

HDD Applications Matrix, 2CQ19
• Mobile HDDs: Seasonally lower branded HDD and notebook PC sales combined with accelerating SSD attach rates to drive total mobile HDDs down by 8% Q/Q to 26.13 million units in the quarter. Despite clear evidence of a notebook PC build-ahead in anticipation of a rise in trade tariffs, the seasonal and SSD impacts appeared to offset any pull-in of demand. Average mobile HDD capacity inched up to 1.26TB while revenue fell by 10% Q/Q to $1.01 billion.
• Desktop HDDs: Desktop HDDs suffered far less impact from the conditions that cut mobile HDD shipments in 2CQ19. Total units slipped just over 1% Q/Q to 15.92 million HDDs. Average capacities rose 50GB from the prior quarter to 1.74TB, but lower ASPs combined with lower unit shipments drove down revenue by 3% sequentially to $0.65 billion.
• Enterprise HDDs: After a year of nearly stable volumes of 2.5″ performance enterprise HDDs, the segment appears to be witnessing a combination of slowing global corporate spending combined with the impact of falling enterprise SSD pricing. In addition, excess last-time-purchases from Western Digital appear nearly complete. 2.5″ enterprise HDDs fell 11% from the prior quarter to 3.99 million units while revenue slipped by 10% to $0.44 billion. Nearline HDDs, represented by 3.5″ enterprise shipments, have advanced with the commencement of the latest round of hyperscale expansion. With a sequential unit shipment rise of nearly 13%, the mix to higher-capacity 14TB models lifted capacity shipments by 19% to 105.72EB. Revenue of $2.3 billion for nearline HDDs also rose 16% Q/Q.
• Consumer Electronics (CE) HDDs: A pull-in of surveillance HDD sales ahead of possible trade restrictions combined with modest seasonal game console HDD shipments to boost total CE HDD shipments in 2CQ19 by 15% to 20.12 million units. The higher-capacity mix of surveillance sharply lifted average 3.5″ CE HDD capacities by 272GB Q-Q to 2.99TB, while 2.5″ CE HDDs lifted to nearly 800GB as the mix of 1TB HDDs increased. Total revenue for CE HDDs rose 15% Q/Q to $0.84 billion.