Western Digital continues to make sure that they protect their major investment in hard drive technology and the company has a history of a conservative growth strategy. WD prefers to see a market mature and then move into markets where they can make a difference.

WD has never said that they wouldn't move into the solid state drive market space, but they have kept any plans to do so close to the chest. Now it would seem that they want buyers to know that they are looking at the SSD market space, but they just don’t feel that the market has matured enough for WD to want to move into this space.

Nonetheless, WD sees some growth potential in both high-end SSDs for those that crave performance or are in an enterprise situation where SSD is a good solution, and the very low-end SSDs that are used in netbooks. WD even sees the possibility for an entirely new generation and form factor for the technology that is being driven by the consumer electronics segment.

We believe that with Seagate taking a hard look at SSD technology and moving forward in this direction, WD needs to start to explore what the possibilities might be for a potential fit into the company’s overall strategy. Still, like many, WD seems to believe as we do that prices are still too high for SSD and it will take more time for this market space to really open up. When it comes to storage, price and performance is everything.