Demand for IT is no longer in freefall, says Seagate
Technologies' newly elevated EMEA vice-president Mark
Whitby.
Whitby, who headed up the UK partner operations at Intel and
globally at Vodafone, joined Seagate as executive director for
emerging markets in September 2007.
With this latest move he takes the driving seat at a company
that racked up
significant losses in fiscal Q2 - the most recent filed
accounts - and made
swingeing job cuts in January.
One of the challenges facing all vendors has been matching
demand with supply. Whitby said that in calendar Q4 the market for
hard drives "fell off a cliff" as the industry produced 160,000
units but sold only 125,000.
Things are slowly changing though, he said. "Demand has levelled
at a pretty constant level so things aren't getting worse, but
sadly they are not getting markedly better either."
"My focus is on getting the company back to a profit and Europe
is a key part of our business," he added.
Seagate cuts 1,100 staff to trim costs >>
This story originally appeared onMicroScope.co.uk
.