Hard disk drive - Seeking new manufacturing paradigms (Singapore's perspectivejor a competitive edge)

A remarkable feature of the hard disk drive (HDD) industry is the high degree of concentration of HDD assembly activities in Singapore. In the period 1986-96 Singapore accounted for 45-50% of the global output of HDDs. In recent years this had declined to 36% in 1998 but in 1999 the total shipped from Singapore was 39%. It should be noted that the value of the HDD output from Singapore had never declined and has grown to more than US$15 billion today. The HDD industry continues to be a significant contributor to Singapore's GDP and will continue to evolve to remain competitive. The composition and the texture of this industry in Singapore will definitely change in line with the more sophisticated and technologically advanced competencies that are being developed or acquired. The business and the manufacturing environment in Singapore will be primed for collaborative engineering supporting various manufacturing enterprise models adopted by a HDD industry which will be more responsive to the markets.