History 2003: Seagate Invests in HDD Components

Seagate Technology has truly made a religion out of “vertical integration,” manufacturing for itself, at least partly, all the essential components of HDD: heads and media, in order never be at the merci of suppliers.

With the failure of Read-Rite, this policy is even more pointed, since there are only a handful of independent head suppliers.

Thus, the HDD maker has decided to increase its production capacities for recording media and magnetic heads. The firm will build a $200 million plant in Singapore, expanding its current media manufacturing site in Woodlands with a new 51,000 square meter 5-story block which will add progressively up to 2,000 new employees.

The factory will be able to produce more than 50% of the company’s total requirement for disks. Established in 1996, the Woodlands operation was Seagate first recording media facility outside North America. Disks are also produced in Milpitas, CA and Northern Ireland.

In Northern Ireland, meanwhile, the company is placing €90 million ($140 million), to which are added €10 million invested by Invest Northern Ireland, to be infused over the next 3 years, more specifically in Springtown for recording heads and in Limavady for aluminum disk substrates.

This article is an abstract of news published on issue 187 on August 2003 from the former paper version of Computer Data Storage Newsletter.