2010 Hard And Optical-Drive Sales Up

By Doug Olenick -- TWICE, 3/17/2010

El Segundo, Calif. - The increased production of PCs is leading to stronger demand for hard disk and optical drives in 2010, according to iSuppli.

Year-over-year revenue for HDDs used in computer applications will grow 18.4 percent to $27.7 billion this year, up from the $23.4 million generated in 2009. Optical-drive revenue will climb 7.6 percent to $14.8 billion from the $13.7 posted the previous year.

Fang Zhang, iSuppli's storage system analyst, said increased notebook computer shipments tied to strong growth in the enterprise server market is spurring demand for hard drives.

The optical-drive market, while continuing to grow, will do so at a slower rate and it will not match the quarterly high-water mark of $4 billion in sales made during the fourth quarter of 2009 until 2011.  At this time, increased demand for gaming, movies and high-quality sound systems should spur optical-drive sales once again passed $4 billion per quarter.