Samsung and Western Digital, two of the biggest hardware makers on the planet, are coming together to improve storage speeds on computers. The two tech giants have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) that will allow them to work together on a new SSD technology.
This is the first time the two hardware makers have teamed up to advance important storage technologies. EVP and GM of Western Digital’s Flash Business Unit, Rod Soderbery commented on the development saying:
For years Western Digital has been laying the foundation for the Zoned Storage ecosystem by contributing to the Linux kernel and open-source software community. We are excited to bring these contributions to this joint initiative with Samsung in facilitating the wider adoption of Zoned Storage for users and application developers.
As part of the partnership, Samsung and Western Digital will work on the broad adoption of next-generation data placement, processing, and fabrics (D2PF) storage technologies. But creating an ecosystem for Zoned Storage solutions will come first.
For clarification, Zoned Storage is a class of storage devices that enable cooperation between the host and the storage device to improve capacity, latency, and efficiency. The partnership will focus on enterprise and cloud applications for technology standardization as well as software development to support D2PF and Zoned Storage.
This will allow multiple vendors to take advantage of Samsung and Western Digital’s new SSD technology.
We will likely hear more about Samsung and Western Digital’s development in the future once the partnership starts to bear fruit.