El Segundo, Calif. — Growing sales of ultra-thin laptops and increased usage in tablets has helped the solid-state drive (SSD) market almost double, according to IHS iSuppli.
The entire SSD category saw shipments of 11.5 million units during the first quarter of 2013, up from 6 million during the first three months of 2012. This figure includes stand-alone SSDs and those in conjunction with a traditional hard disk drive (HDD) to create hybrid drives.
About 5.9 million of the SSDs shipped were installed in Ultrabooks and ultra-thin laptops, but the research firm noted a growing use in tablets.
Tablet SSD usage was 1.6 million units, up from 542,000 during the first quarter of 2012, the company said.
IHS reported first-quarter HDD shipments were down 7 percent to 135.7 million units from the same period a year ago. The falloff was blamed on the consumer segment of the market, which comprised 93.3 million of the units shipped, down from 105.3 million during the 2012 first quarter, due to lower sales of desktop PCs and notebooks.
The enterprise HDD market remained strong as corporations continue to require large amounts of inexpensive storage and due to the increasing use of Cloud storage by consumers.
Western Digital remained the top HDD shipper during the quarter, leading Seagate and Hitachi.
