Like Seagate, Western Digital doesn’t see a market to enter in the form of SSDs right now. They’re open to it, and eventually will make their mark, but at the moment it’s not compelling to them. I love this quote from one of their head marketing guys that makes it sound like the company runs on clockwork:
Western Digital enters markets that exist, announces products when they are available, and runs a tight model with opportunities greater than resources such that we take a controlled, methodical, sequential, incremental approach to product portfolio expansion.
Mr. Rutledge then rakishly added, “In bed.”
Seriously, though, it looks as if spinning hard drives are going to be around for a good long time yet for certain price points; although we think of them as being volatile and archaic, they’re really unbelievable little machines and I don’t blame companies like WD and Seagate for wanting to protect their investments.