Assessing the Value of Flash Drives in the Age of SSDs and Cloud Storage

In an exclusive interview with Asia Business Outlook, Rajesh Khurana, Country Manager, BIWIN Technology, shares his take on the increasing role of flash storage technology in a fast-paced world being taken over by faster communication networks and computing power-intensive applications like generative AI. He also offers remedies to manufacturers to stay relevant in the current digital world. He has over 30 years of experience managing storage and surveillance solutions and has managed numerous territories in South Asia.

Flash drives have been a staple for portable storage due to their compact size and ease of use. How do you see the role of flash drives evolving in the current era dominated by SSDs and cloud storage solutions?

Solid State Drives (SSD) are high-speed. They have a faster input/output operations rate and are compact without compromising reliability. It is better than its predecessor, the hard disk drive (HDD), on every possible metric. SSDs have different interfaces, such as the SATA (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment) and NVMe (Non-Volatile Memory Express). Though the SATA is relatively slower than the latter, it still triumphs over the standard HDD. The NVMe is currently the preferred interface in the market. The third generation of SSDs has been prominent in the market for the past few years with a speed of 3000Mbps. The fourth generation surpasses the third generation with a speed of 7000Mbps.

The fifth generation is currently in the process of making its way into the mass markets. It boasts a transfer rate of 14,500Mbps. The pattern being seen here is that there is considerable growth for high-speed devices, which can have lightning-speed IO rates. The role of flash drives becomes apparent when speed is a primary prerequisite. People are turning to SSDs to improve the performance of their existing PCs. Applications that require fast IO speeds, such as AV, content delivery and telemedicine, all operate with SSDs in their systems. Cloud storage is basically a data center that has an abundance of SSDs installed.

Cloud storage provides the benefit of remote access and scalability, how do flash drives and cloud storage complement each other in a hybrid storage strategy for both individuals and enterprises?

Cloud storage, in technical terms, is a data center that manages the inputs of 1s and 0s. This is the basic principle that every application works on. The speed and storage requirements vary from application to application. Let’s take an example of retrieving an image from Facebook that was uploaded by an individual five years ago. Technically, you have uploaded a digital image that is not needed on a daily basis on their cloud. So ample and fast storage isn’t necessary from your end.

Hybrid storage is a combination of flash drives and hard drives. In case of necessity of storage in the order of tens of terabytes, it is suitable to use a hard drive. However, in many applications where time is a critical factor and immediate responses are mandatory, SSDs are to be leveraged. A good enterprise example for this scenario is the banking sector. The banking sector demands immediate response in the event of financial transactions with customers and commercial organizations alike.

An Enterprise operation on a cloud facility generates a lot of heat, so robust and scalable systems are of the essence. Currently, we are seeing cutting-edge devices making their way into the consumer markets. There are autonomous devices, telemedicine is becoming mainstream, and all these operations push data centers to their limits and expect quick responses. When a quick response is expected, the SSDs come into the foray, as they have low latency and lack moving parts. A suitable combination of SSDs and HDDs is a necessity to build a robust and scalable system.

How has the role of flash drives in data transfer and temporary storage been impacted by the availability of SSDs and cloud storage?

In India 5G adoption is occurring at a rapid pace. By the end of 2024 we can expect a 50% adoption rate. This will increase the speed requirements and low latencies will dominate the picture. This is setting the stage for more advanced and novel applications reliant on real time IO. This will pave the way for IoT use cases on content delivery networks.

With regards to the impact, this will create an ecosystem where autonomous vehicles are normalized, video surveillance will become more advanced. The elephant in the room is the emergence of generative AI, which is being used everywhere by everyone. The stronger the rise of AI and ML the more demand it generates for flash storage. At the end of the day, the flash storage thrives with an increased necessity for faster data transfer.

What trends or innovations in flash drive technology could help maintain their relevance in the face of growing SSD and cloud storage capabilities?

The key terminology is enhancement of speed of ecosystems. The rise of 5G and AI has accentuated the need of huge data and high speeds coupled with low latency. Manufacturers must look into upgrading their infrastructure to enable higher storage density. Capacities must increase without the device taking up additional space.

The common denominator for catering to all technological trends is low latency while maintaining robustness. This must be followed for both commercial and consumer requirements. BIWIN boasts a 32-layer die-stacking technology capable of catering to the needs of major electronics companies, which only some IC packaging companies possess. This is an absolute prerequisite as we see DDR5 tech becoming mainstream.