Western Digital Corp. (NASDAQ: WDC) today expanded its portfolio of data storage devices purpose-built for the modern surveillance market, introducing three new offerings: the industry's first industrial-grade 3D NAND UFS embedded flash drive (EFD) for surveillance; an expanded WD Purple microSD card series to support up to 256GB2 capacity; and Western Digital® Device Analytics, the new device analytics technology enabling OEMs and system integrators to proactively manage their storage subsystems and maintain optimal operation.

The new devices and tools address the complex and dynamic data demands of a surveillance market in transformation, supporting the high performance, capacity and endurance required by networked and artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled camera systems, as well as other smart video devices operating at the edge.

"As the adoption of higher resolution and AI-enabled cameras expands, and traditional centralized surveillance video systems become more distributed, fast and reliable storage with higher capacities are essential for enabling surveillance devices to capture, analyze and transform greater amounts of data, locally, and in real-time," said Oded Sagee, senior director, product marketing, Western Digital. "With the new devices and analytics capability introduced today, we are excited to enable the new era of smart video and AI-driven surveillance systems with the industry's most comprehensive offering for surveillance, from the edge to the core."

In modern video surveillance, video and its rich metadata provide valuable insights for use in both forensic analyses and predictive actions, ranging from consumer behavior in retail environments, traffic patterns in cities or crowd control in public environments. Whether in an NVR, IoT gateway, multi-access edge computing node (MEC) or other configurations, surveillance cameras and edge systems are key elements of real-time, AI-enabled systems, driving increased demand for more reliable and advanced storage solutions that can operate efficiently in rugged, 24/7 environments.

Industry's First 3D NAND UFS-Based EFD for Surveillance

Built on the company's advanced 3D NAND architecture, the Western Digital iNAND® IX EU312 UFS EFD brings UFS speeds combined with industrial grade high endurance and high capacities to cameras and smart video applications at the edge. The new device delivers read speeds of up to 750 MB/s1 and write speeds of up to 320 MB/s1, which support read- and write-intensive use cases, including AI-enabled video cameras and edge devices. Support for up to 768 TBW provides the robust endurance levels required for the continuous recording conditions. The EFD features advanced NAND flash management firmware, including robust error correction code (ECC), read refresh, wear-leveling and bad block management.

Expanded Surveillance-Class Storage for 4K- and AI-Enabled Video at the Edge

In April 2018, Western Digital introduced the WD Purple microSD card designed specifically for surveillance cameras, bringing the WD Purple series' high performance, endurance and reliability to always-on video surveillance cameras at the edge. Now leveraging 3D NAND technology and available in capacities ranging up to 256GB2 with support for up to 1,000 P/E cycles, the WD Purple microSD card line delivers long-lasting, on-camera storage for the demanding 24/7 continuous operation workloads required by AI-enabled and high-resolution professional surveillance cameras. The microSD card supports operating temperatures ranging from -25°C to 85°C and is humidity resistant to support continuous operation in extreme weather conditions and a variety of indoor and outdoor environments. For more information on the WD Purple microSD card and the complete Western Digital Purple surveillance portfolio, visit https://www.wdc.com/edge-to-core.

Proactive Storage Management with Western Digital Device Analytics

Supported by Western Digital's WD Purple hard drive, WD Purple microSD cards, and the Western Digital IX EU312 UFS EFD, the device analytics technology provides system integrators and end users unprecedented ability to proactively manage storage on their surveillance systems. Device analytics provide a set of parametric operational and environmental data to the host system that ultimately helps users pre-empt potential issues. Through its deep analytics capability, device analytics can extract insights and provide integrators and users with recommended actions that will allow improved monitoring and proactive management of their systems to help maintain optimal storage operation, and in turn contribute to reduced total cost of ownership (TCO).

Western Digital Enables Surveillance Data to Thrive

The new Western Digital iNAND UFS EFD, high capacity WD Purple microSD cards and Western Digital Device Analytics technology together complement a full portfolio of data storage devices for today's surveillance needs. The portfolio includes the Western Digital WD Purple Surveillance HDD for high-capacity support for NVRs and DVRs, the Ultrastar® HDD series for use in back-end storage, video analytics servers, and deep learning systems, and the company's industrial grade iNAND e.MMC, SD™ and microSD storage solutions for use with surveillance cameras and a variety of connected surveillance applications. Together, they provide OEMs, surveillance system integrators and installers a complete edge-to-cloud solution to capture, preserve, access and transform data.

About Western Digital

Western Digital creates environments for data to thrive. The company is driving the innovation needed to help customers capture, preserve, access and transform an ever-increasing diversity of data. Everywhere data lives, from advanced data centers to mobile sensors to personal devices, our industry-leading solutions deliver the possibilities of data. Western Digital® data-centric solutions are marketed under the G-Technology™, HGST, SanDisk®, Tegile™, Upthere™, and WD® brands.

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Western Digital, the Western Digital logo, iNAND, Ultrastar and WD Purple are registered trademarks or trademarks of Western Digital Corporation or its affiliates in the U.S. and/or other countries. SD and microSD Logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of SD-3C, LLC in the United States, other countries or both. All other marks are the property of their respective owners. Pictures shown may vary from actual products. Product specifications subject to change without notice. © 2018 Western Digital Corporation or its affiliates. All rights reserved.

1 – One megabyte per second (MB/s) = one million bytes per second. Based on internal testing; performance may vary depending on your hardware and software components and configurations.

2 – As used for storage capacity, one gigabyte (GB) = one billion bytes. Total accessible capacity varies depending on operating environment.

Forward-Looking Statements

This news release contains certain forward-looking statements, including the expected availability, benefits, features and performance of the Western Digital iNAND IX EU312 UFS EFD storage product, WD Purple microSD card and device analytics technology. There are a number of risks and uncertainties that may cause these forward-looking statements to be inaccurate including, among others: changes to specifications from standards organizations, volatility in global economic conditions; business conditions and growth in the storage ecosystem; impact of competitive products and pricing; market acceptance and cost of commodity materials and specialized product components; actions by competitors; unexpected advances in competing technologies; our development and introduction of products based on new technologies and expansion into new data storage markets; risks associated with acquisitions, mergers and joint ventures; difficulties or delays in manufacturing; and other risks and uncertainties listed in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC"), including the company's most recently filed periodic report, to which your attention is directed. You should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date hereof, and the company undertakes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements to reflect subsequent events or circumstances.