Morgan Stanley Research: Data Center HDD/SSD Demand Remains Strong, Enterprise SSD Shipments Expected to Double by 2026

August 3rd, Morgan Stanley released a report stating that the June HDD/SSD data continued to show strong data center demand. TSR predicts that by 2026, enterprise SSD shipments for data centers will reach 525EB, a 100% year-on-year increase, while nearline HDD shipments for data centers will reach 1845EB, a 30.4% year-on-year increase.

The report shows that in June, the shipment of enterprise SSDs to data centers was 46.33EB, a 124.5% year-on-year increase and a 12.0% increase from the previous month. During the same period, the shipment volume of enterprise SSDs was 6.35 million units, a 41.1% year-on-year increase and an 8.9% increase from the previous month. Morgan Stanley believes that as the proportion of high-capacity products increases, the SSD shipment volume growth rate will continue to outpace the unit shipment volume growth rate.

On the HDD side, the production volume of nearline HDDs in June was 7.03 million units, a 12.3% year-on-year increase, and a slight 0.6% decrease from the previous month. TSR predicts that by 2026, the production volume of nearline HDDs will reach 84.39 million units, a 12.8% year-on-year increase.

However, the report notes that the subsequent increase in nearline HDD production may be constrained by head and testing capacity. Overall, AI and data center capital expenditure continue to drive storage capacity demand, but supply chain bottlenecks are spreading from end devices to critical components.