Economics

Thai HDD industry: a choice to stay or walk away?

Name: Top Food science conference 2019
Start: 2019-12-02T09:00:00+07:00
End: 2019-12-03T17:00:00+07:00
Location: MIDNICE Gallery

Thailand is ranked the second largest Hard Disk Drive (HDD) producer in the world after China

Published

2 years ago

July 30, 2017

Headline Editor

The Thai HDD industry is likely to grow as a large HDD manufacturers recently expanded production.

Thailand is ranked the second largest Hard Disk Drive (HDD) producer in the world after China, with large manufacturers like Western Digital (WDC) and Seagate Technology (Seagate), along with part producers such as Nidec, Minebea, and TDK.

Highlight

With the production relocation of a large HDD firm to Thailand, The Thai HDD industry is looking to bloom despite the industry’s global decline. Thailand will also benefit from growth in the data market, continued development of HDD technology, and HDD’s price advantage.
Opportunities for Thai producers of HDD parts are there, but businesses should start not fully rely on the industry. There is still time to make adjustments to prepare for changes in the market in the future.

WDC cut back production in Malaysia and expanded in Thailand’s Prachinburi province while Seagate terminated factories in China and Malaysia and increased investment in their production base in Nakornratchasima province in Thailand. These events should raise Thai HDD exports by at least 15%

However, SSD is replacing HDD usage. HDD shipments dropped 8% CAGR during 2013-2016 while shipments of Solid State Drives (SSD) surged around 37% CAGR. More importantly, annual global demand for HDD declined from 420-480 million units to only 300 million units.

The switch to SSD is because the NAND flash memory in SSD is superior to the disk technology employed by HDD in various dimensions, including access speed, stability, and durability. Moreover, new memory storage technology in SSD known as 3D NAND now allows larger storage capacity and is no longer inferior to HDD as was the case in the past. Production costs for larger storage s have declined comparison to HDD

SSD replacement for HDD could happen when there is no difference in cost per gigabyte (GB) between the two technologies. Indeed, the difference could still exist but at a smaller price difference because the choice between HDD and SSD does not only concern cost per GB. Consumers must consider indirect costs such as maintenance and electricity expenses as well and SSD beats HDD on those parameters.

However, HDD now holds an edge on cost per GB as HDD prices are 4 times lower than SSD in the 500GB model range (1,430 baht for HDD versus 5,790 baht for SSD)*. In fact, SSD’s cost per GB recently picked up and widened the difference with HDD due to a shortage of NAND flash, an important part of SSDs.

The shortage was due to both a fall in supply and higher demand. Supplies dropped because the industry is currently transitioning from 2D NAND to 3D NAND. On the other hand, the surge in demand for NAND comes not only from SSD producers, but also from smartphone and tablet producers.

According to JPMorgan, around 8,542 million NAND is to be used to make smartphones and tablets in 2017, up 56% from 2016. The use of NAND in SSD totals 7,795 millions this year, up 46% from 2016.

In addition, the Big data boom is seeing HDD usage grow in data center business. Despite the wide usage of SSD in personal computers and hyper-scale data centers such as Amazon, the booming big data trend makes data and information a key success factor in business and points to higher demand for data storage. According to a report by Cisco, data in data centers in 2020 will exceed 2016 levels by 3.6 times and use HDD to store less frequently used, such as backup data, to save costs. At the same time, high-potential yet expensive SSD is used in data storage system where performance is needed to support fast data processing and access.

HDD technology is being developed further. HDD makers are not only upgrading existing storage technology such as SMR (Shingled Magnetic Recording) and Helium-filled drive to raise storage capacity, they also plan to develop new technologies such as TDMR (Two-Dimensional Magnetic Recording) and BPMR (Bit-Patterned Media Recording). These new technologies will improve weakness such as low durability and increase the…

Author: Punyapob Tantipidok and Nicha Thanabhusest

Source link

Economics

Finance Ministry cuts economic growth outlook to 2.8%

The Ministry of Finance has now cut the country’s economic growth outlook to 2.8%, from the previous 3%.

Published

2 weeks ago

October 30, 2019

National News Bureau of Thailand

BANGKOK (NNT) – After three quarters, the global economic slowdown and the ongoing trade war between China and the United States, are still having an adverse impact on the Thai economy.

(more…)

Asean

We’ve entered the Asian Century and there is no turning back

In the nineteenth century, the world was Europeanized. In the twentieth century, it was Americanized. Now, it is being Asianized – and much faster than you may think.

Published

2 weeks ago

October 30, 2019

The World Economic Forum

Asia’s rise has been swift. Home to more than half of the world’s population, the region has climbed from low- to middle-income status within a single generation. By 2040, it is likely to generate more than 50% of world GDP, and could account for nearly 40% of global consumption.

(more…)

Economics

EIC Export growth forecast for 2019 is maintained at -2.5%

Without a clear signal of export recovery, EIC views that during the 4th quarter of 2019 the export contraction momentum will continue

Published

2 weeks ago

October 30, 2019

Economic Intelligence Center Siam Commercial Bank

Although China and the US reached a preliminary trade agreement on October 10-11, 2019, the ongoing trade war should still drag on, pressuring export growth throughout the remainder of the year. Hence, EIC maintains its -2.5% export growth forecast for 2019.

(more…)