Seagate Says AI Is Making Data Storage More Strategic Than Ever

Key Points

• AI is increasing the strategic value of data storage as organizations generate, retrieve and process larger volumes of information, especially previously discarded or inaccessible unstructured data.
• Seagate said improving computing power, algorithms and metadata tools are making unstructured data easier to identify and use, while 55% of surveyed organizations reported significant losses after deleting data that later proved valuable.
• The company expects accessible “nearline” storage to become more important than traditional cold storage and urged businesses to treat data strategy as a cross-functional priority involving IT, operations and business leaders.

Seagate Technology NASDAQ: STX said the expansion of artificial intelligence applications is increasing the strategic importance of storing, accessing and protecting large volumes of data, particularly unstructured data that organizations may previously have deleted or placed in inaccessible archives.

During an AI infrastructure discussion at The Six Five Summit 2026, a Seagate representative said the storage industry has shifted substantially from its roots in the personal-computer era. While hard drives once served consumer devices, PCs and a range of other applications, the company said mass-capacity data is now concentrated in data centers.

“Eighty percent of the world’s data is on a hard drive in the data center right now,” the Seagate representative said, adding that data volumes continue to grow as AI applications create, retrieve and process information across a growing number of use cases.

AI Drives Tighter Links Between Applications and Infrastructure

Patrick Moorhead, co-founder of Six Five Media, said the current AI era differs from earlier technology transitions in part because of the growing integration among software, data and hardware. He pointed to the emergence of agentic AI and the increasing importance of data infrastructure in supporting it.

The Seagate representative said AI is disrupting not only software but also the broader software ecosystem and stack surrounding data-intensive applications. Cloud service providers have developed increasingly efficient hardware and software architectures, the representative said, with fewer handoffs between layers and a stronger connection between the end application and the underlying infrastructure.

That architectural shift is expected to extend beyond large cloud environments and toward the edge, according to the representative.

Moorhead highlighted the growing efforts by storage vendors and startups to bring database and embedding capabilities closer to storage. He said organizations have historically made greater use of structured data housed in relational databases than unstructured data.

In response, the Seagate representative said faster silicon, more efficient algorithms and improvements in the compute layer have made it more feasible to extract, create and preserve data. The representative also pointed to the increased use of object stores and rapid metadata transactions in memory layers, which can allow systems to identify and retrieve specific underlying data when needed.

Unstructured Data Gains Value

The Seagate representative said unstructured data has become more useful because it is more accessible than it was in the past. Geographic locality, the ability to process information with machines and reduced requirements for human intervention have all changed significantly over the past decade, the representative said.

In some cases, the value may rest in metadata surrounding unstructured data rather than in the underlying files themselves. An algorithm can determine which specific data is needed and retrieve it, the representative said.

Seagate’s research involving CIO-type respondents found that data is becoming more important to organizations and that companies increasingly recognize the need to retain more information, according to the representative. The representative said 55% of survey respondents reported losing significant money after deleting data that later proved valuable. The losses cited were tied to missed opportunities rather than compliance penalties.

Examples can include factory information that may provide operational insights if retained longer, as well as customer data that could support acquisition or service efforts, the representative said.

• Organizations need to decide what data to retain and what to discard.
• Data should be stored in a manner that remains accessible for future use.
• Business leaders across functions should participate in data strategy decisions.
• Companies should prepare to adapt quickly as AI tools and software stacks evolve.

Nearline Storage and Data Strategy

The Seagate representative said traditional “cold storage” may become less practical if data is so far offline that a person must restore it before it can be used. Seagate describes its products as “nearline” storage, the representative said, and argued that nearline systems could become a preferred mechanism as the industry expands capacity and lowers storage costs.

For corporate leaders, the representative said the key shift is to view data infrastructure as a broader business issue rather than solely an IT responsibility. Storage decisions have often been delegated to chief information officers, but organizations with factories, customer-service operations and general administrative functions may require different strategies for each area, the representative said.

Rather than assigning responsibility to a single executive, such as a chief data officer or chief AI officer, the representative advocated for “teams of teams” working cross-functionally on a common strategy. Data leadership roles historically focused on security and data leakage, but companies now must also consider what to retain and how to use it, the representative said.

Looking ahead, Seagate said it intends to keep advancing hard-drive density and improve the accessibility of data on individual drives and at the system level. The representative also identified data protection, data location and control over who can access information as growing areas of focus, including discussions around sovereign data.

“It’s not only more data, it’s also data faster,” the Seagate representative said, describing the priorities being set by customers.

About Seagate Technology (NASDAQ:STX)

Seagate Technology NASDAQ: STX is a global data storage company that designs, manufactures and sells a broad range of storage products and systems. The firm's product portfolio includes traditional hard disk drives (HDDs), solid-state drives (SSDs), hybrid storage devices and integrated storage systems aimed at enterprise, cloud, OEM and consumer markets. Seagate also provides services that support its hardware offerings, including data recovery and storage management solutions.

Seagate's products are used in a wide array of applications, from large-scale data centers and cloud infrastructure to desktop and portable consumer devices.

This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to contact@marketbeat.com.

Continue following MarketBeat

Add MarketBeat as your preferred source on Google to see our latest stories in your feed.

Add As Preferred Source