Fujitsu sees strong growth in drives

By Ed Frauenheim
Posted on ZDNet News: Oct 30, 2003 12:22:00 AM

Fujitsu Computer Products of America on Wednesday announced strong growth in its shipments of hard disk drives in the third quarter. The company said its worldwide shipments of enterprise hard disk drives increased to more than 1.2 million units, a 78 percent gain over the previous quarter and a 47 percent rise compared with the same quarter last year. Enterprise drives refer to disk drives that are used in data storage devices for corporations and the government. Fujitsu also said the number of mobile drives it shipped in the third quarter hit 2 million units, a 19 percent increase from the second quarter and a 90 percent jump year over year. Mobile drives are used in notebook computers.

Fujitsu's upbeat shipment news comes as the disk drive industry is enjoying a sunny outlook due to a shrinking number of drive makers as well as growing demand for disk drives in relatively new consumer applications.