As more users get access to higher data usage and higher speed broadband Internet connections, hard drive sales in South Africa have increased.<\/p>\n
Western Digital’s fastest growing market locally is their external hard drives, said Ian Keene, senior director of sales at Western Digital.<\/p>\n
According to Keene, Western Digital saw a strong increase in sales leading up to the football World Cup, with external drive sales in South Africa increasing 250% over the last year.<\/p>\n
The sales manager for the Benelux nations and South Africa at Western Digital, Barber Brinkman, said that they see a market in South Africa for over a million internal hard drives and around 500,000 external drives in the coming year.<\/p>\n
In terms of revenue, this translates to a market expectation of around US$50 million for internal drives, whereas Brinkman estimated the local external hard drive market to be around US$40 million.<\/p>\n
Keene said that they still expect much growth in South Africa’s external hard drive market since the current growth comes from a low base.<\/p>\n
The cost of external storage has also declined in South Africa and elsewhere according to Keene. “There is no excuse for people to lose their data since external storage is so affordable now,” he said.<\/p>\n