Hard disk drive sales boom

An estimated 126 million hard disk units will ship this year, compared to 105 million in 1996. This figure is expected to grow to 201 million units by the year 2000, worth a staggering $75 billion.

While the report indicates that 3.5-inch drives still dominate the market with an expected 106 million drives this year, largest growth is expected in removable cartridges. Shipping an estimated 1.9 million drives this year, cartridge companies can expect rapid growth to achieve sales of 5.5 million by the year 2000.

The report added that Seagate was still number one in the industry in 1996 with a 26.8 per cent, although it was shipping only non-captive drives. IBM came in second with a mixture of captive and non-captive drives and a market share of 24.4 per cent.