Seagate top executives to visit Dubai, Egypt

The five-member delegation, led by Don Kennedy and Marc Jourlait, Seagate's Vice President Global Channel Sales and Marketing and its Vice President Global B2B Marketing respectively, will meet with distributors, clients and potential business partners in the region from March 4.

Seagate currently accounts for more than 30 per cent of the regional market for digital storage, estimated to reach four million units annually. The rising popularity of shareable and portable digital content, including music, video, photos and games, and Seagate's recent acquisition of digital storage specialist Maxtor could drive those numbers much higher.

"Seagate is committed to serving the Middle East market to the best of its ability, and the upcoming visit is only one example of our sincerity and dedication," Kennedy said. "Seagate has a track record of moving quickly when it decides to focus on new markets. 2007 is going to be a big year of investments for Seagate in the Middle East."

In November 2006, Seagate identified the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt as the three major growth markets in the MENA region. It has since established the Cairo Service Centre as part of its focus on improving customer care in the region.

Seagate's DAVE devices have also grabbed the region's attention. The Digital Audio Video Experience technology is designed to store, play and share digital files on mobile phones, personal computers, wireless consumer electronics devices and large enterprise networks.

The company also recently announced partnerships with Quantum SPA and STMicroelectronics to produce hard drive-based mobile devices that will allow consumers to receive, record and play back digital television signals. Seagate has also partnered with Microsoft to promote and raise awareness for data backup.

The delegation to the Middle East also includes Gulfem Cakmakci, Channel Sales Manager EMEA; and Ziad Abou Rahal, MEA Channel Manager.

With more than a quarter century of industry expertise, Seagate continues to be the driver of innovative solutions for the storage industry. Today no other hard drive manufacturer matches Seagate's breadth of solutions. With more than 40 products covering home computing to enterprise data centers, Seagate delivers advanced solutions for every industry that requires digital storage.

The company leads the industry in research and development, with a focus on bringing to market new technologies that will meet the needs of future generations. It has been first to market with technologies that power digital life, from the home to the hand to the car and the office, such as perpendicular recording, hardware-enabled full disk encryption and hybrid drives, and continues to invest in the development of new technologies to increase performance, speed and area density (the ability to store more data in less space).