Seagate Technology 2024 Trends and Predictions: The Future of Data Storage in the AI Era

Seagate® Technology, a world leader in mass-data storage infrastructure solutions, shares its insights on what to anticipate  in the data storage landscape for 2024.

The current AI era has created an unprecedented demand for data storage. IDC estimates that 291ZB of data will be generated in 2027.The speed at which data is growing is calling for continued or even accelerated innovation to cope with the exploding demand for storage.

1. As generative AI becomes more democratized, data storage will drive AI success.

• By 2026, Gartner predicts that over 80% of enterprises will have used generative AI APIs and models and/or deployed gen AI-enabled applications in production environments, up from less than 5% early 2023. A Gartner poll also shows that 55% of organizations are in piloting or production mode with gen AI. Gartner expects generative AI to account for 10% of all data produced over the next two years, drastically up from less than 1% today.
• Businesses will be saving more operational data to teach AI, machine learning, and deep learning models moving forward; more companies will train models on both external and internal data so they can benefit from their proprietary information.
• Hyperscale tech giants are expected to accelerate investment into cloud capacity in an effort to support AI program maturation. AI will also drive increased IT spend and data storage demand in the enterprise, as businesses seek a competitive edge through improvements to productivity and efficiency.

2. Data center refreshes will benefit from leaps forward in hard drive areal density.
   • Nearly 90% of data in cloud data centers resides on hard drives. As data center infrastructure approach natural refresh cycles, there is an opportunity to replace fleets of lower-capacity hard drives with higher capacity drives.
   • The average hard drive capacity in data center today is 16TB, based on conventional PMR technology. The new HAMR technology can physically store more bits on a single drive, essentially it will enable data center managers to populate those same slots with 30TB high-density drives, yielding significant power and space savings and massive TCO efficiencies—including CPU, RAM, and floor space.
   • On top of that, HAMR technology will also help data center operators to further reduce their carbon footprint with more durable and energy efficient storage, playing an even more influential part in tackling the 53.6 million metric tons that make up the global e-waste mountain.

3. Flash and hard drive technology will continue to coexist in the data center in 2024.
   • The exponential growth of data will drive demand for mass-capacity hard drives, whose synergy with flash storage will continue to support modern workloads.
   • Latest analyses from IDC, TRENDFOCUS, and Forward Insights confirm that hard drives will remain the most cost-effective option for most capacity-centric storage tasks.
   • The demand for storage capacity in the cloud—where the vast majority of the world’s data resides—is only expected to increase, and hard drives will be the primary beneficiary of this exabyte growth.
   • Hard drive storage will offer mass data storage at less than one-fifth the cost of comparable all-flash solutions on a per bit basis. Relative to data center architectures, the value gap will not come close to closing next year—or over the next decade.

4. Data storage will shape three major applications of the future.

• Edge Computing and Internet of Things (IoT): The integration of edge computing with IoT technologies is pushing the boundaries of data storage, demanding unprecedented levels of scalability, latency, and operational flexibility to correlate real-time data with vast historical datasets for immediate analysis and forecasting. For instance, digital twins, virtual presentations of physical systems like cities or industrial complexes require both real-time and historical data for accurate simulations and predictions.

• Quantum Computing and Data Processing: The rise of quantum computing demands new data storage architectures to prevent data loss due to the volatile nature of qubits. Additionally, classical encryption methods become obsolete, requiring quantum-safe cryptographic solutions. Current systems optimized for classical computing will be inadequate for the unique data transfer needs between quantum processors and storage mediums, making quantum networking a critical component for redefining data transmission and security.

• Genomic Data and Precision Medicine: The sheer volume of genomic data is a challenge that goes beyond mere storage capacity – a single human genome requires up to 200GB of storage space. As this data accumulates across millions of individuals, healthcare systems face not only logistical hurdles but also ethical and privacy concerns. Advanced analytics tools using machine learning algorithms are also being fine-tuned to analyze this vast amount of data swiftly and accurately. This evolving data infrastructure aims to pave the way for a future in healthcare where genomic profiles guide everything from preventive measures to targeted therapies, thereby enhancing patient outcomes and healthcare efficiency.