Toshiba is significantly expanding its hard-disk-drive manufacturing capacity as the rapid growth of AI data centers and cloud infrastructure creates unprecedented demand for high-capacity storage.
The company announced on October 2, 2026 that its Philippine manufacturing facility has begun production from an expanded nearline HDD line. Toshiba is investing around ¥60 billion (approximately $380 million) to increase production capacity, with the expansion expected to be completed by fiscal 2027.
The company is also preparing for a new generation of high-capacity drives. Toshiba plans to introduce 30TB-class HDDs in 2027, followed by 40TB-class drives and eventually 65TB and 100TB-class products. The company is using technologies including MAMR (Microwave-Assisted Magnetic Recording) to increase storage density.
The move highlights an important side effect of the AI boom: while AI companies are primarily associated with GPUs and advanced processors, the huge amount of data generated and stored by AI systems is also creating enormous demand for traditional storage hardware.
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