# Western Digital

> Western Digital, now branded simply WD, is one of two companies left on Earth that still makes hard disk drives at scale. After spinning off its SanDisk flash business in 2025, WD narrowed to a single job: building the giant, high-capacity nearline drives that fill hyperscale data centers. Roughly 89% of its revenue now comes from cloud customers hoarding storage for the AI boom - and in early 2026 the company sold out its entire year of drive production before it was made.

- **Founded:** 1970
- **Headquarters:** San Jose, California, United States
- **Founders:** Alvin B. Phillips (Founder (as General Digital, 1970))
- **Team size:** ~40,000 employees
- **Products:** Ultrastar DC nearline HDDs, 40TB ePMR drives, HAMR / UltraSMR roadmap, WD Red / WD Blue / WD Black, WD_BLACK gaming storage
- **Notable:** One of only two companies in the world that still manufactures hard disk drives at scale, Holds roughly 47% of the mass-capacity HDD shipment market as of early 2026, ahead of Seagate, Reported fiscal 2026 revenue of $12.9 billion, up 36% year over year, with gross margin near 49%

## Products & services

- **Ultrastar DC nearline HDDs** — High-capacity enterprise hard drives (CMR and UltraSMR) built for hyperscale data centers, the core of WD's business.
- **40TB ePMR drives** — New 40TB energy-assisted perpendicular magnetic recording drives aimed at AI-scale storage.
- **HAMR / UltraSMR roadmap** — Next-generation heat-assisted and shingled magnetic recording tech to push capacities toward 44TB and beyond.
- **WD Red / WD Blue / WD Black** — Consumer and prosumer internal drives for NAS, desktops, creators and gamers.
- **WD_BLACK gaming storage** — External and internal drives marketed to gamers and console owners.
- **My Passport / My Book external storage** — Portable and desktop external hard drives for consumers and small business backup.

## Achievements

- One of only two companies in the world that still manufactures hard disk drives at scale
- Holds roughly 47% of the mass-capacity HDD shipment market as of early 2026, ahead of Seagate
- Reported fiscal 2026 revenue of $12.9 billion, up 36% year over year, with gross margin near 49%
- Sold out its entire calendar-2026 hard-drive production amid AI-driven data-center demand
- Completed the spinoff of SanDisk into an independent public company in February 2025
- Began shipping 40TB ePMR nearline drives for AI-scale storage in 2026

## Latest updates

- **2026-08** — Reported fiscal Q4 2026 revenue of $3.75 billion, up 44% year over year, and guided Q1 above $4 billion on AI storage demand.
- **2026-04** — Reported strong fiscal Q3 2026 results; cloud/nearline demand continued to outstrip supply.
- **2026-02** — Reported that its entire 2026 hard-drive production was effectively sold out as AI data centers scrambled for capacity; moved to the shorter 'WD' brand.
- **2025-02** — Completed the separation of SanDisk, which began trading independently on Nasdaq under ticker SNDK.
- **2024-10** — Irving Tan became Chief Executive Officer of Western Digital.

## Links

- Website: https://www.westerndigital.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/western-digital
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/westerndigital
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/westerndigital
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/westerndigital
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/WesternDigitalCorporation

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/wd
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-08-12