Hitachi GST Snags Substrate Facility From WD

Here's an interesting one. Hitachi Global Storage Technologies has just snapped up a substrate manufacturing facility located in Sarawak, Malaysia from Western Digital. You heard right -- one hard drive maker is taking some property from a rival hard drive maker. In the release, we're told that the facility that Hitachi GST is taking over produces aluminum substrates used in hard disk drives, which WD originally ended up with when it purchased Komag in 2007.


Steve Milligan, president, Hitachi GST, had this to say about the agreement: "This acquisition further strengthens Hitachi GST and is the next step in our business transformation. The Sarawak facility is located in close proximity to existing Hitachi GST suppliers and drive assembly operations, which will enable us to realize increased operational efficiencies and other long-term benefits." Colleage Ian Sanders, VP of the components group, chimed in with this: "The Malaysian and Sarawak governments have been instrumental in Hitachi GST efforts to develop a local manufacturing presence. We thank them for their ongoing support and look forward to growing our employee base in Malaysia. Sarawak has a highly-skilled workforce with a worldwide reputation for manufacturing and technology excellence. Our goal is to have the Sarawak team play an important role in strengthening our product competitiveness by providing Hitachi GST with greater access to world-class components."


We're told that the closing of the acquisition is subject to customary conditions, which means that everything should be complete just as soon as the right paperwork is filled out. It's hard to say what affect this will have on end users, though we get the idea most folks won't even notice the difference.