Toshiba establishes new HDD technology centers

The "HDD Advanced Technology Center" will seek to accelerate development of higher density technology and the "HDD Manufacturing Technology Center" will develop enhanced manufacturing capabilities. Toshiba will cooperate in the development work with TDK Corporation, which manufactures magnetic heads, and Showa Denko K.K., a disk media manufacturer. In 2004, Toshiba led the industry in introducing perpendicular magnetic recording technology (PMR), now the dominant technology for high areal density HDD, and in doing so realized significant advances in hard disk drive capacity. However the physical limit of PMR is widely recognized at around 1.6Gbit/mm2 (1Tbit/in2) and densities beyond that will require further technology breakthroughs. Toshiba, in cooperation with TDK and Showa Denko, is establishing an HDD Advanced Technology Center to focus on innovation in future generations of higher capacity HDD by investigating promising technologies, including energy-assisted technologies and bit pattern technology. Outline of HDD technology centers HDD Advanced Technology Center Established: July 16, 2011 Location: Toshiba's Ome Operations - Storage Products General Manager: Kotaro Yamamoto HDD Manufacturing Technology Center Established: July 16, 2011 Locations: Toshiba's Ome Operations - Storage Products General Manager: Tsutomu Tanaka