Western Digital
Canvas Category Hardware : Information Technology : Data Storage
Western Digital has long been at the forefront of game changing innovations. From the invention of the first hard drive to recent advancements in 3D NAND our journey of innovation continues to inspire those who dare to think big.
Assembly Line
🇯🇵 Kioxia, Western Digital to invest $4.9bn in cutting-edge memory chips
Japan’s industry ministry said Tuesday it will help fund the mass production of cutting-edge memory chips by Kioxia Holdings and Western Digital (WD).
The two companies’ investment totals 729 billion yen ($4.9 billion), and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry will provide up to 243 billion yen in funding. The plan is to supply the chips for use in data centers, demand for which is likely to grow, driven by the increasing use of generative artificial intelligence applications.
It Takes Two: Why Digital Twins Need Both Humans and Machines
When Western Digital expanded its hard drive manufacturing site in Thailand, the first time the assembly lines were turned on wasn’t on the factory floor; it was on a laptop 8,000 miles away. Before any physical machinery found its place within the newly constructed walls, teams of engineers meticulously crafted its virtual counterpart. This digital twin could mimic the operations down to every tool, robot arm, and even the pace of human operators, flawlessly simulating the assembly of the company’s most advanced enterprise hard drives. Engineers could quickly test different layouts and operation scenarios without touching the production line.
For most projects, Sanguanpong could go into the factory and measure parameters like cycle times, yield, output, or level of automation. Here, she needed to extrapolate data from experts about machines and processes that had yet to materialize. “Because there is no physical operation in the building, we the advanced analytics team needed to validate our findings with the subject matter experts, making sure our simulation model fit the expected action,” she said. Data needed to constantly flow in and out of the model, relying not only on algorithms but on the capacities of human communication and imagination.
Recharged: How Data Builds Better Batteries
“Our technology is based on a process called electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS). Essentially, we inject a sine wave and measure the battery’s response. It’s used in labs around the world to measure cells,” said Chung. “In terms of the data itself, batteries have collections of data like voltage, current, and temperature, but that isn’t that useful for understanding the overall health. AC impedance, which is what we gather through EIS, is what really lets us understand the health of the battery. That lets us build a degradation curve — to actually monitor the battery over time.”
Western Digital’s Journey To Build Business Resiliency Through Cloud And ERP Transformation
In 2019, Western Digital started the most crucial part of the transformation journey. This fourth and final phase would transform manufacturing, inventory operations, and intercompany finance for 10 manufacturing plants across five countries, contract manufacturers and end users in a future-ready platform. Infosys was engaged to bring in an outside-in industry view to challenge current business practices and identify opportunities to harmonize process across the sites and standardize by eliminating custom practices.
The program was divided in multiple sub-phases. First sub-phase involved transforming manufacturing operations and intercompany transfers between component factories alongside payroll consolidation, reporting consolidation in Oracle BI. Second sub-phase had as many as 12 parallel projects for bringing hard disk drive manufacturing operations to cloud and consolidating all shipping and revenue operations, making way to retire two out of three legacy ERPs.
Global Lighthouse Network: Unlocking Sustainability through Fourth Industrial Revolution Technologies
The Global Lighthouse Network is a community of production sites and other facilities that are world leaders in the adoption and integration of the cutting-edge technologies of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR). Lighthouses apply 4IR technologies such as artificial intelligence, 3D-printing and big data analytics to maximize efficiency and competitiveness at scale, transform business models and drive economic growth, while augmenting the workforce, protecting the environment and contributing to a learning journey for all-sized manufacturers across all geographies and industries.