At an event held in São Paulo this Thursday (25), Western Digital, one of the largest manufacturers of data storage devices in the world, spoke a little about its market positioning, launch strategies, business vision and much more.
TechSmart had the chance to cover the event, where we were able to talk a little with Alexandre Jannonni, country manager at Western Digital. During the interview, we covered topics such as the launch of SSDs dedicated to the PS5, national manufacturing, the computer market and the electronic components crisis.
TC: In 2021, Sony released an update for the PS5 that allows expansion of the console’s SSD storage and Western Digital is one of Sony’s nominated manufacturers. You even recently released a custom version of the SN850 that comes with a box that makes it clear that it’s meant for the PS5.
Are there plans to bring this device to Europe? If so, do you plan to produce domestically, as this would make the product cheaper for consumers?
WD: Yes, there are plans to bring these products to Europe, but as you mentioned, because they have a high added value, some distributors are a little afraid of importing these products and ending up with them in stock.
So we’ve been trying to work with partners like KaBum!, for example, who have the capacity to bring and offer these products with a minimum stock, so to speak. So they’re able to make products really available to enthusiasts and customers who are really very specific.
Regarding the local production of SSDs, especially those of greater precision, we do not have any plans for Europe. These are very complex products to manufacture, which start the production process in Japan and are then taken to Thailand for completion, which would require a very high investment to manufacture in Europe.
It is worth remembering that the Europeian market is mostly for PlayStation, much more than Xbox or Nintendo, so it is certainly in our interest to make these products available here through online channels.
TC: And as for the component crisis. Did you have any problems? Are they still passing?
WD: Yes, we went through a very serious critical phase. We had a period with a shortage of some products.
The biggest problem was in the foundries, at the beginning of the process, which is who gathers the materials to arrive at the conductor and the integrated circuits.
At the beginning of the pandemic, no one really knew what was going to happen and many decided to close the factories and sent the employees away, but about three months later, there was a boom in the sale of technology products. The problem is that when you shut down a factory of this size, you can’t get back up and running in a week, taking more than a year for things to get back to normal.
And this period was very bad, because there was a lack of raw material for everyone. So yes, we went through a period in which inventories were lacking a lot, but over time, things started to normalize and now I would say that it is practically balanced and with a lot of product to sell.
TC: AMD recently spoke about being concerned about the PC market after the pandemic boom, as things are now returning to the way they were before. In the case of Western Digital, how do you see this return to what it was before the pandemic in terms of consumption?
WD: The way we are seeing it is that there was a level in 2019, 2020 and 2021 this level rose and at the end of the pandemic, when the transition from personal to corporate notebooks began, as many companies decided to update their equipment with the return of face-to-face work, there was a stabilization, but now, it is very clear that this period was a boom and that we have to return to the reality of the levels of 2019.
From the point of view of results, we continue to supply the market, understanding this drop, but as our company is present in several sectors (structures, servers, data centers, the game market itself), we have the capacity to ” cover” this reduction in demand, something that is felt more strongly by other companies that are more specific, such as manufacturers of video cards, processors, etc.
