Seagate Technology Holdings
One of only three companies that make hard drives, selling most of them to the cloud companies that store the world's data.
The scores
Growth3/4 ↑
Revenue grew 34% in FY26 and 48% in June, its own and organic, but it tracks cloud storage spending and fell 37% in FY23.
Business quality3/4 →
One of three makers, first with HAMR and pricing up, but Toshiba is adding capacity, flash chases the job and prices have always turned.
Financial position3/4 ↑
About $1.9B of net debt against $4.09B of operating income, spread maturities and an undrawn line; not net cash, and FY23 tested it.
Execution record3/4 ↑
Beat adjusted EPS estimates eight quarters running and brought HAMR to 40% of nearline exabytes, after a decade of delay and FY23's loss.
Per share capture3/4 ↑
Exchangeable notes added about 10% to the share count since FY23 and are now redeemed; stock pay is under 2% of revenue.
Potential2/4 ↑
Exabytes grow about a quarter a year, but FY28's forecast needs prices to keep rising in a cycle cloud spending controls, on unfiled contracts.
Risk profile3/4 →
One customer is 14% of revenue and plants sit in Thailand, China and Malaysia on rare earths sourced mostly in China.
Valuation1/4 ↓
24.5 times FY27 profit, with FY28's forecast keeping 52% of revenue as profit, a margin this industry never held through a cycle.
Evidence quality3/4 →
Results, debt and the rival's agreements are filed and the market is measured outside; the 2028 allocation and pricing rest on management's word.
The Verdict
We rate Seagate Technology unattractive. It is a solid business in a very good year: revenue grew 34% in FY26, and its drives are spoken for into 2028 at rising prices. The price is stretched. At about 24.5 times what analysts expect it to earn in FY27, buyers are paying for profit margins this industry has never kept through a cycle. The last time supply caught up with demand, in FY23, revenue fell 37% and the company lost money. Toshiba now plans to nearly double its capacity, and flash makers keep chasing the same job. The business is strong, but the price assumes the shortage lasts.
The long caseCloud companies are storing data faster than drive makers can add capacity, and Seagate leads the new recording technology; it must hold prices when supply catches up.
The evidence under this - 6 claims
Neither volumes nor terms are filed, and the 10-K warns that a key customer cutting purchases hurts results 'particularly if we are unable to collect any applicable cancellation charges' (C33); Western Digital, by contrast, files that its agreements commit agreed volumes at predetermined or formula prices (C17).
- 2026-10-28editedthe Q1 FY27 call: allocation held at 2028, some agreements run to 2030, but pricing is locked only through 2027
Management already guides an adjusted operating margin of about 50% for the September quarter (C04), with incremental gross margin well above 60% (C16), so much of the margin FY28 needs is in the current run rate.
Citi says Toshiba buys its heads and media, so suppliers must expand too; Morgan Stanley says the supply gap through 2028 is wider than Toshiba's addition (S10).
Flash prices have since risen faster than hard drive prices: the gap per terabyte widened from 4.9 times in Q2 2025 to 22.6 times in Q1 2026 by VDURA's index (C23).
The company
Seagate makes hard disk drives: metal platters spinning inside a sealed box, written and read by tiny magnetic heads. Most go to cloud companies such as Amazon, Google and Microsoft, and to the server makers that supply them, as 24TB to 44TB drives for data they must keep cheaply.
Its newest drives, called Mozaic, use a laser to heat each spot before writing it, which packs more data on every platter. Seagate shipped 789 exabytes of storage in FY26, a third more than the year before.
The evidence under this - 3 claims
Backblaze's Q2 2026 statistics show Seagate's 24TB drive failing at 3.3% a year against 0.55% to 1.1% for comparable Western Digital and Toshiba drives (C25), and Western Digital ships its own 44TB HAMR drive in the first half of 2027 (C18).
How it makes money
Seagate earns money by selling storage capacity. In FY26 data center drives brought in 80% of revenue and smaller drives for cameras, PCs and consumers the other 20%. Most sales go through server makers, and one customer alone was 14% of revenue.
What keeps the money coming is that data keeps growing and drives wear out. What decides how much is the price per unit of storage, which rises when drives are short and falls when they are not.
The evidence under this - 4 claims
Where the money comes from, stream by stream
| Stream | Share of sales (FY 2026) | How it earns it |
|---|---|---|
| Data center | 80% | High-capacity nearline drives, mostly HAMR and conventional 24TB to 44TB drives, sold to cloud companies and server makers. |
| Edge IoT | 20% | Drives for surveillance, network storage, PCs and consumer external storage, sold through distributors and retail. |
Who runs it
Dave Mosley has run Seagate since 2017 and became chair in 2025. He brought the laser-assisted drive into volume after years of delay and also ran the company through FY23's loss. Gianluca Romano, formerly of Micron, has been finance chief since 2019.
Directors and officers own less than 1% of the company and bought no shares in the year. Their bonus pays on revenue and profit margin, and their long-term shares on return on capital, which rewards a high-margin year like this one.
The evidence under this - 3 claims
Why it wins, and who could beat it
Why customers come back
Only three companies make hard drives, and Seagate and Western Digital make their own heads and disks at a scale nobody else matches. That is why prices are rising: Seagate's price per unit of storage rose 10% from a year earlier in June, Western Digital's 8% over its year, and an outside firm found waits for drives above a year.
Customers have no cheap alternative. Flash costs about 20 times as much for the same space, so rarely read data still goes on hard drives.
The evidence under this - 5 claims
Revenue per exabyte rose only from $15.29M to $15.46M over FY26 (C07), so the year's growth came from volume; the price rise is recent.
- 2026-10-28editedthe Q1 FY27 call: analysts put the quarter's price per terabyte up in the mid-teens percent and management did not dispute it
These are 2025 shares: Seagate's exabytes rose 33% in FY26 (C07), and Nikkei puts Toshiba at just over 10% by capacity in 2026 (C19).
Flash prices have since risen faster than hard drive prices: the gap per terabyte widened from 4.9 times in Q2 2025 to 22.6 times in Q1 2026 by VDURA's index (C23).
VDURA sells software for mixed hard drive and flash fleets, so it is not a neutral party, and flash makers are adding high-capacity drives (C22).
The threat
Toshiba, the third maker, says it will nearly double its capacity by FY2027 and wants 30% of the market, from just over 10%. Western Digital ships its own laser-assisted 44TB drive in early 2027.
Flash makers are building ever larger drives, and Everpure says its flash systems will go after hard drives once flash prices allow. Today the price gap keeps them out.
The evidence under this - 4 claims
Citi says Toshiba buys its heads and media, so suppliers must expand too; Morgan Stanley says the supply gap through 2028 is wider than Toshiba's addition (S10).
Western Digital's 40TB drive uses the older recording method and its HAMR drive is still in qualification, which Seagate's has passed at all major cloud customers (C06).
Flash prices have since risen faster than hard drive prices: the gap per terabyte widened from 4.9 times in Q2 2025 to 22.6 times in Q1 2026 by VDURA's index (C23).
Flash costs about 20 times as much as hard drives per terabyte (C23), so the price at which Everpure says it would go after hard drives is far off.
The rivals: WDC, SNDK, MU, P, and 1 more that is private, in-house or listed abroad.
Who else does this, rival by rival
| Ticker | Rival | How far along | Priced against it |
|---|---|---|---|
| WDC | Western DigitalPriced against it: Same product | On sale | Same product |
| Private | Toshiba Electronic Devices & StoragePriced against it: Private | On sale | Private |
| SNDK · MU | Flash makers: Sandisk, Kioxia, Samsung, SK hynix and MicronPriced against it: Different product | On sale | Different product |
| P | EverpurePriced against it: Different product | On sale | Different product |
How big it could get
How big this could get
Outside analysts expect about 2,017 exabytes of hard drive storage to ship in 2026, up from 1,340 in 2024, with AI's share rising from 18% to 43% by 2028. At late-2025 prices that is roughly $30B to $32B a year.
Seagate already sells about two fifths of it. Analysts' FY28 forecast of $25.38B in revenue would be most of today's whole market, so the forecast needs prices to keep rising.
The evidence under this - 4 claims
Data created is not data stored on hard drives: TrendForce expects flash to take more of the nearline job where drives are short (C22).
Flash prices have since risen faster than hard drive prices: the gap per terabyte widened from 4.9 times in Q2 2025 to 22.6 times in Q1 2026 by VDURA's index (C23).
These are 2025 shares: Seagate's exabytes rose 33% in FY26 (C07), and Nikkei puts Toshiba at just over 10% by capacity in 2026 (C19).
Who has signed
Management says most of its drives are allocated to cloud customers into 2028, with designs and prices set for all of 2027. The annual report says only that some of these commitments carry cancellation charges. No volumes or prices are filed, so the agreements are management's description, not documents a reader can check.
The evidence under this - 2 claims
Neither volumes nor terms are filed, and the 10-K warns that a key customer cutting purchases hurts results 'particularly if we are unable to collect any applicable cancellation charges' (C33); Western Digital, by contrast, files that its agreements commit agreed volumes at predetermined or formula prices (C17).
- 2026-10-28editedthe Q1 FY27 call: allocation held at 2028, some agreements run to 2030, but pricing is locked only through 2027
The results
The numbers
Sales grew 34% in the year to Jul 2026, about the same pace as the 39% in the year before.
Operating margin is 34%, up from −4.6% in the year to Jun 2023.
Running costs take 12¢ of each sales dollar, about where it was (13¢) in the year to Jul 2022.
Each dollar put into the business earns 69% a year after tax, up from 33% in the year to Jul 2022.
It turned 25% of sales into free cash, $3.10B over the year.
It owes $1.86B more than the cash it holds, about 0.5 years of the cash its operations bring in.
The share count rose 2.2% in 4.0 years, and pay in shares costs 1.7% of sales.
All the numbers
Filed figures from the company's 10-K and 10-Q, read 2026-10-06. Fiscal years end in July.
| Jul 2022 | Jun 2023 | Jun 2024 | Jun 2025 | Jul 2026 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Size and growth | |||||
| Sales | $11.7B | $7.38B | $6.55B | $9.10B | $12.2B |
| Sales growth | +9.2% | −37% | −11% | +39% | +34% |
| Profit | |||||
| Gross margin | 30% | 18% | 23% | 35% | 46% |
| Operating margin | 17% | −4.6% | 6.9% | 21% | 34% |
| Net margin | 14% | −7.2% | 5.1% | 16% | 26% |
| What growth costs, per sales dollar | |||||
| Research and development | 8.1% | 11% | 10.0% | 8.0% | 6.2% |
| Selling, general and admin | 4.8% | 6.6% | 7.0% | 6.2% | 4.7% |
| Pay in shares | 1.2% | 1.6% | 1.9% | 2.2% | 1.7% |
| Capital spending | 3.3% | 4.3% | 3.9% | 2.9% | 4.7% |
| Cash | |||||
| Cash from operations | $1.66B | $942M | $918M | $1.08B | $3.67B |
| Free cash flow | $1.28B | $626M | $664M | $818M | $3.10B |
| Balance sheet | |||||
| Cash and short-term investments | $615M | $786M | $1.36B | $891M | $1.70B |
| Debt | $5.65B | $5.45B | $5.67B | $5.00B | $3.56B |
| Net cash | −$5.03B | −$4.67B | −$4.32B | −$4.10B | −$1.86B |
| Returns and shares | |||||
| Return on capital | 33% | - | 8.1% | 42% | 69% |
| Shares (diluted) | 224M | 207M | 212M | 217M | 229M |
What growth costs
Growth has been cheap. Revenue rose 34% in FY26 while running costs rose about 4%, so the share of sales left as operating profit went from about 21% to about 34%. Putting more data on each drive needs few new factories. The same arithmetic works in reverse: in FY23 a 37% fall in revenue turned a profit into a loss.
The evidence under this - 2 claims
The same leverage runs in reverse: in FY23 revenue fell 37% and an operating profit became a $342M loss (C12).
The last report (28 Jul)
Quarter ended July 2026, filed figures.
In the September quarter, revenue rose 61% from a year earlier to $4,233M, above the $4.1B Seagate had guided, and adjusted profit was $7.68 a share against a guided $7.30. It shipped a record 198 exabytes of cloud storage and guided the December quarter to $4.8B.
On the call, analysts put the rise in price per terabyte at about 15% in one quarter. Management said it comes mostly from contracts being renewed at higher prices, partly to cover dearer parts, and that prices are fixed only through 2027.
What it did to the thesisIt strengthened the near-term case: demand and pricing are still rising. It did not answer the question the price depends on: whether prices hold in 2028 and later, which is not yet fixed.
The quarter in detail
Sales growth from the previous quarter, filed figures.
Earnings per share $5.71 against $5.10 expected.
The evidence under this - 2 claims
The 10-K says the nearline sales cycle can exceed a year and that demand depends on cloud capital spending, which 'has in the past' led to significant cancellations (C33).
- 2026-10-28editedthe September quarter was reported and the December quarter guided; the call gave the margin range
Revenue per exabyte rose only from $15.29M to $15.46M over FY26 (C07), so the year's growth came from volume; the price rise is recent.
- 2026-10-28editedthe Q1 FY27 call: analysts put the quarter's price per terabyte up in the mid-teens percent and management did not dispute it
What management did with the money
Seagate used the boom to repair its balance sheet. It cut debt from about $5B to $3.6B in FY26 and expects about $2.4B by September, paid a dividend, and retired the bonds that had been turning into new shares. Buybacks are now stepping up.
Insiders in 2026Q3: 77 purchases and 426 sales, from their Form 4 filings.
The evidence under this - 2 claims
Buybacks were $176M in FY26 against $634M of dividends (C11), so the step-up is a stated plan rather than a record.
The price, and where we disagree
In short. Priced for perfection. It pays for profit margins no drive maker has held through a downturn, kept through 2028.
The shares rose 248% in a year, peaked in June and are 22.5% below their high. On 2 October they fell 10.2% in a day when Nikkei reported Toshiba's plan to add capacity, then recovered part of it as analysts called the fall overdone.
That day showed how much of the price rests on the shortage lasting. The 27 October report showed prices still rising, with drives allocated into 2028 and some agreements to 2030, but prices fixed only through 2027. The next report, on 26 January, will show whether 2028 prices are fixed.
The evidence under this - 4 claims
Citi says Toshiba buys its heads and media, so suppliers must expand too; Morgan Stanley says the supply gap through 2028 is wider than Toshiba's addition (S10).
Neither volumes nor terms are filed, and the 10-K warns that a key customer cutting purchases hurts results 'particularly if we are unable to collect any applicable cancellation charges' (C33); Western Digital, by contrast, files that its agreements commit agreed volumes at predetermined or formula prices (C17).
- 2026-10-28editedthe Q1 FY27 call: allocation held at 2028, some agreements run to 2030, but pricing is locked only through 2027
How we read the multiple
A buyer pays for profit that depends on the shortage lasting.
1. Analysts expect earnings of $36.16 a share in FY27 and $57.02 in FY28. 2. Today's price is about 24.5 times the first and 15.6 times the second. 3. The FY28 forecast keeps about 52 cents of every sales dollar as profit. 4. Seagate kept 26 cents in FY26, and 14 cents at its FY22 peak.
Buyers usually pay little for each dollar of a cyclical industry's peak profit, because that profit falls when supply catches up.
Against its own history. Buyers pay several times the company's own normal for its earnings, at the moment those earnings are the highest it has ever made.
The evidence under this - 4 claims
Management already guides an adjusted operating margin of about 50% for the September quarter (C04), with incremental gross margin well above 60% (C16), so much of the margin FY28 needs is in the current run rate.
Priced against its rivals
Only Western Digital sells the same thing to the same buyers as a large part of what it does. A price comparison needs at least two, so the price is judged against its own history instead.
Private or foreign rivals that cannot be priced: Toshiba Electronic Devices & Storage Corporation, NAND flash suppliers (Samsung, SK hynix and Solidigm, Kioxia, Micron, Sandisk).
Where we disagree with the market
An AI storage winner sold out into 2028, whose new technology and pricing power make this cycle different from the last.
FY27 is close to secured, but FY28's forecast needs margins to double again in an industry whose prices always turned when supply caught up.
Allocation is not a contract a reader can see. The annual report mentions cancellation charges only in certain circumstances, and Toshiba's new capacity and flash makers' larger drives both arrive in 2027 and 2028, the years the forecast needs.
Against us: next quarter is already guided at about 50% operating margin, analysts expect the supply gap through 2028 to outlast Toshiba's addition, and on FY28's forecast the price is only about 16 times earnings.
What analysts say, and the evidence
The evidence under this - 6 claims
Neither volumes nor terms are filed, and the 10-K warns that a key customer cutting purchases hurts results 'particularly if we are unable to collect any applicable cancellation charges' (C33); Western Digital, by contrast, files that its agreements commit agreed volumes at predetermined or formula prices (C17).
- 2026-10-28editedthe Q1 FY27 call: allocation held at 2028, some agreements run to 2030, but pricing is locked only through 2027
Citi says Toshiba buys its heads and media, so suppliers must expand too; Morgan Stanley says the supply gap through 2028 is wider than Toshiba's addition (S10).
Flash prices have since risen faster than hard drive prices: the gap per terabyte widened from 4.9 times in Q2 2025 to 22.6 times in Q1 2026 by VDURA's index (C23).
What could go wrong, and how we would know
The risks
- The cycle turns When supply caught up last time, FY23 revenue fell 37% and an operating profit became a $342M loss.
- Toshiba adds supply Toshiba plans to nearly double its capacity by FY2027 and aims to triple its share of the market.
- Flash closes the gap Flash makers are building larger, cheaper drives; if the price gap narrows, new data goes to flash instead.
- Few customers, few places One customer is 14% of revenue, and drives are built in Asia from rare earths mostly sourced in China.
- A quality warning In one large buyer's fleet Seagate's 24TB drive failed at 3.3% a year, against 0.55% to 1.1% for rival drives.
- Unwritten commitments Customers can cut orders; the annual report says cancellation charges apply only in certain circumstances.
The evidence under this - 6 claims
Citi says Toshiba buys its heads and media, so suppliers must expand too; Morgan Stanley says the supply gap through 2028 is wider than Toshiba's addition (S10).
Flash prices have since risen faster than hard drive prices: the gap per terabyte widened from 4.9 times in Q2 2025 to 22.6 times in Q1 2026 by VDURA's index (C23).
What we still do not know
- How much of the volume allocated into 2028 is under contracts with fixed volumes or cancellation charges, and at what prices after 2027.
- How much storage Toshiba's expansion actually adds by 2028, and when its laser-assisted drives pass customers' tests.
- Whether the high failure rate of Seagate's 24TB drive in one buyer's fleet shows up elsewhere.
The evidence under this - 3 claims
Neither volumes nor terms are filed, and the 10-K warns that a key customer cutting purchases hurts results 'particularly if we are unable to collect any applicable cancellation charges' (C33); Western Digital, by contrast, files that its agreements commit agreed volumes at predetermined or formula prices (C17).
- 2026-10-28editedthe Q1 FY27 call: allocation held at 2028, some agreements run to 2030, but pricing is locked only through 2027
Citi says Toshiba buys its heads and media, so suppliers must expand too; Morgan Stanley says the supply gap through 2028 is wider than Toshiba's addition (S10).
What would change our view
- Unattractive→NeutralA cheaper price on unchanged forecasts
It needs:
- ○The shares fall to 15 times analysts' FY27 earnings forecast, from about 24.5 today.about $543.12 today, 39% below the last close
- Unattractive→NeutralThe shortage is contracted, not just allocated
It needs all of:
- ○Seagate states or files agreements with fixed volumes and prices running into 2029.watched as it happens
- ○Price per unit of storage is still rising from a year earlier in the March 2027 quarter.checked at the next results, due by 26 Jan
We would also be wrong if
- Seagate reports that its price per unit of storage fell from a year earlier.
- Storage growth falls below the mid-20s percent management targets, or customers cut allocations already set for 2027.
- A cloud company moves much of its storage to flash.
What is coming
- 28 October 2026 Q1 FY27 results: Revenue against the $4.1B guide, price per exabyte, and whether allocations and prices now reach 2028 or 2029.
Every dated event ahead
- 28 October 2026 Q1 FY27 results: Revenue against the $4.1B guide, price per exabyte, and whether allocations and prices now reach 2028 or 2029.
- 17 November 2026 Final approval of the class action settlement: Whether the $175M settlement, about $105M net of insurers, closes as agreed.
- 30 June 2027 Western Digital's 44TB HAMR drive ships: Whether Seagate's lead in data per drive narrows, and whether price per exabyte holds as it does.
Since we wrote this
- 28 OctEarningsCall read: prices rising, fixed only through 2027Revenue beat and prices rose faster, but contracts fix prices only through 2027, so the price still pays for a long shortage.
- 27 OctEarningsSeagate beat its own guide and guided the next quarter to $4.8B. View heldFiscal Q1 2027 results.
- 6 OctThesis writtenUnattractive, medium convictionWritten four days after Toshiba's capacity plan cut the shares 10.2%, with the shares up 248% in a year and 22.5% below their high.
Also checked 3 times with nothing new to act on.
Sources 24
Sources - 24
Every claim above cites one of these, or states the reasoning that derived it. The quote is frozen at the date it was read: a link can rot, and an agent fetch returns a reading of a page rather than the page. Backs counts the whole claim ledger, so it can name a claim this page does not surface.
- S01primarycompany filing2026-08-04products, markets and channels, the named competitors, exabytes shipped, customer concentration, plants, rare earths, the risk factors on cycles and cancellation charges, FY26 statements, debt and maturities, legal proceedings and IDC's datasphere forecastbacksC01C02C05C07C08C09C10C11C21C30C33
- S02primarycompany release2026-07-28Q4 FY26 results, the GAAP to non-GAAP reconciliation and the September quarter guidancebacksC02C03C04
- S03primarytranscript2026-07-28Seagate Q4 fiscal 2026 earnings call transcript (FMP), held 28 July 2026the allocation into 2028, the HAMR ramp, the mid-20% exabyte target, pricing per exabyte, incremental margin, debt reduction and buybacks
Based on the long-term supply agreements in place today, the vast majority of our nearline exabytes are now allocated into calendar 2028.
backsC04C05C06C10C16C32 - S04primarycompany filing2026-09-08directors and officers, ownership, the bonus and performance share designbacksC27C28
- S05secondaryvendor data2026-10-05Research pack (FMP market data, FINRA, SEC filed figures), frozen as research-pack.jsonprice and range, the price move split, analyst estimates and the rating series, price target drift, short interest, insider trades and statistics, and the earnings reactionsbacksC12C13C14C26C29
- S06primarycompany filing2026-08-14Western Digital Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended 3 July 2026 Western Digitalthe competitors it names, in-house heads and media, exabyte and price-per-exabyte growth, and how its long-term agreements bindbacksC17
- S07primarytranscript2026-08-05Western Digital Q4 fiscal 2026 earnings call transcript (FMP), held 5 August 2026 Western Digitalits HAMR and 40TB drive timing, price and cost per terabyte, and its long-term agreements
We are on track to ship our 44-terabyte HAMR product in the first half of calendar year 2027.
backsC18 - S08primarycompany release2026-10-02Toshiba's capacity plan in its own words; read by an agent fetch after the site refused this repository's fetcher
TIP will continue to invest in production expansion, aiming to nearly double its annual production capacity by FY2027 compared with FY2025 on a storage capacity basis.
backsC19 - S09secondarynews2026-10-02the investment, the share target and the cost of flash against hard drives, from Nikkei's report
While Toshiba currently holds just over 10% of the market by storage capacity, it aims to increase that share to 30% over the medium term, according to Nikkei.
backsC19C23 - S10tertiarynews2026-10-02Morgan Stanley's, Citi's and Rosenblatt's readings of Toshiba's plan
Citi said Toshiba does not make its own media and heads, so outside suppliers would also have to expand, which could limit the exabytes that reach the market.
backsC26 - S11primaryindustry data2025-09-15nearline lead times and QLC flash as the substitute
As a result, lead times for nearline HDDs have ballooned from just a few weeks to over 52 weeks, further widening storage gaps for CSPs.
backsC22 - S12primaryindustry data2025-10-14hard drive price per gigabyte, the flash makers' nearline drives and their cost edge
As a result, the average price per GB has increased from US$0.012-0.013 to US$0.015-0.016, diminishing HDD’s main cost advantage.
backsC22 - S13secondaryindustry data2025-05-17Blocks & Files: Disk drive capacity shipments out to 2030 forecast to rocket upwards (reporting Coughlin Associates) Coughlin Associatesunits and exabytes by maker for Q1 2025
Seagate shipped 11.4 million drives and 143.6 EB earning $2.003 billion with a 40 percent market share.
backsC20 - S14secondaryindustry data2026-07-06Horizon Technology: Hard drive capacity and the race to 100TB (citing Coughlin Associates' May 2026 analysis) Coughlin Associateshard drive exabytes shipped in 2024 and 2026 and AI's share through 2030
of the roughly 2,017 exabytes of HDD capacity expected to ship in 2026, around 363 exabytes, or 18% of the total, is demand attributable specifically to the AI buildout.
backsC21 - S15secondaryindustry data2026-04-08the price gap between flash and hard drives per terabyte
by Q1 2026, 30 TB QLC SSD capacity cost 22.6 times as much as equivalent 30 TB HDD capacity.
backsC23 - S16primaryindustry data2026-06-30the data created worldwide by 2030
The IDC Global DataSphere is on a trajectory to surpass 700ZB by 2030
backsC21 - S17primaryindustry data2026-09-30enterprise flash demand and flash contract prices
Bit demand for enterprise SSDs is projected to grow by more than 80% YoY in 2026 as CSPs continue to expand AI inference infrastructure.
backsC23 - S18primarytranscript2026-08-26Everpure (formerly Pure Storage) Q2 fiscal 2027 earnings call transcript (FMP), held 26 August 2026 Everpurethe hyperscaler agreements and what its flash modules replace
Now our solution can be extended down to HDDs when the pricing comes back into line.
backsC24 - S19primaryindustry data2026-09-29Backblaze Drive Stats for Q2 2026 Backblazefailure rates by drive model in one buyer's fleet
The quarterly AFR is 1.73% , the highest it’s been in quite a while.
backsC25 - S20secondarynews2026-02-03Toshiba's HAMR timing
Small-scale production for customer evaluation is scheduled to begin in fiscal year 2027, followed by full-scale mass production in fiscal year 2028.
backsC19 - S22tertiarynews2026-10-0524/7 Wall St.: Western Digital jumps 7%, Seagate climbs 5% as Bernstein calls Toshiba selloff a storm in a teacup 24/7 Wall St.the analysts' reading of the fall, and the rebound
Bernstein called the reaction “a storm in a teacup” and stated it would buy both Western Digital and Seagate on the selloff.
backsC26 - S23primarycompany filing2026-10-06revenue, operating income, net income and diluted shares for FY2021 to FY2026backsC11C12C13
- S24primarycompany release2026-10-27Q1 FY27 results, the reconciliation and the December quarter guidancebacksC04
- S25primarytranscript2026-10-27Seagate Q1 fiscal 2027 earnings call transcript (FMP), held 27 October 2026the allocation into 2028 and 2030, when pricing is locked, how pricing and external component costs moved, the 4% to 6% capital framework and the buyback restart
The vast majority of our nearline exabyte supply is now allocated under long-term supply agreements through calendar 2028 with some cloud customer agreements extending through calendar 2030.
backsC04C05C16