Hard drives at the heart of AI innovation!

In the AI era, data is business currency, and hard drives are the vaults storing this valuable resource. With a surge of generative AI (GenAI) applications driving explosive data creation – from richer media to larger files – exabyte growth is at an unprecedented rate. Unlike traditional AI, GenAI is not only a data consumer, but also a powerful creator.

Storage is the key!
This data explosion isn’t just a byproduct of AI. It’s a cycle where AI and data continually fuel each other's growth. Data doesn't exist in a vacuum – storage upholds data, and in turn, upholds all AI innovations. Viewing AI primarily as a compute problem is shortsighted; storage is an integral part of AI workflows and the backbone of data preservation that AI relies on. 

As multimodal LLMs and vision models emerge, along with compliance and regional mandates, data becomes richer and more complex. While clouds are the epicenter of AI innovation, the edge and endpoint generate vast data volumes for workloads like visual effects and scientific research. Local storage is essential for speed, privacy, and compliance. As AI proliferates, storage will be needed everywhere — in every environment, location, and use-case— to manage massive datasets and ensure trustworthy AI.

Given the pivotal role storage—especially hard drives— play in AI innovation and unlocking value in untapped proprietary data, business leaders must prioritize a strategic storage approach within their AI plans.

Criticality of hard drives 
Hard drives are indispensable in AI storage clusters due to their scalability, cost-efficiency, and sustainability. Seagate’s analysis of IDC’s Cloud Infrastructure Index 2023 shows that hard drives store 90% of exabytes in the world’s largest data centers. 

Additionally, 90% of enterprise exabyte workloads include AI data retention, analytics, and backup, which require high capacity, yet relatively moderate data processing time. These workloads are best suited for hard drives, thanks to the drives’ cost-per-terabyte advantage. 

Recent advancements in hard drive areal density have enhanced both AI performance and energy efficiency. They tripled storage capacity in the same footprint or deliver 2.6 times better power efficiency and 3.5 times reduction in embodied carbon per terabyte. These innovations make hard drives essential and capital-efficient for delivering the AI exabytes to data centers handling diverse workloads across various industries.

Optimizing AI storage
To harness AI’s potential, businesses need cost-effective, scalable hard drive solutions for long-term data retention and access. Proactive storage capacity planning, and strategic sourcing for the long-term is key for enterprises to unlock the full value of AI data. 

Winning businesses are the ones who can increase storage capacity dramatically, while decreasing total cost of ownership and resource impact. For business leaders feeding AI's voracious appetite for data alone is not sufficient – only those who can also maximize that data’s capabilities efficiently and sustainably, will be the winners.

Future of AI storage
The future of AI hinges on storage. As AI drives innovation, data drives AI, and storage drives data. Advancing storage architecture will be critical in realizing AI’s promise, empowering businesses to stay ahead in this transformative era.

-- Futoshi Niizuma, VP, Asia-Pacific and Japan Sales, Seagate Technology.