Hitachi Data Systems taps new CEO
Iwata, a 29-year veteran of HDS parent company Hitachi, spent four years at HDS, where he helped to create the alliance with Hewlett-Packard that propelled the company's high-end storage systems into mainstream use. Since August 2000, he's been general manager of Hitachi's International Business Planning and Development Division.
The company has aggressive plans for the future, including funds of up to $1.25 billion to invest in mergers and acquisitions within the next year. In 2002, the company's goal is more market-share expansion, a direction that likely means a continuation of the price war between HDS and its larger rival, EMC.
EMC and HDS specialize in high-end storage systems that can maintain connections with many servers simultaneously, handling large numbers of transactions as information is written to and read from databases. EMC once enjoyed plump profit margins, but the slumping economy has forced it to cut prices to keep up with competition from IBM's Shark product as well as HDS' 9900 "Lightning" system sold by HP and Sun Microsystems. Compaq Computer, too, now has a competing product. --Stephen Shankland, Special to ZDNet News