ITEM 1. BUSINESS

We are a leading provider of data storage technology and infrastructure solutions. Our principal products are hard disk drives, commonly referred to as disk drives, hard drives or HDDs. In addition to HDDs, we produce a broad range of data storage products including solid state drives (“SSDs”) and storage subsystems and offer storage solutions such as a scalable edge-to-cloud mass data platform that includes data transfer shuttles and a storage-as-a-service cloud.

HDDs are devices that store digitally encoded data on rapidly rotating disks with magnetic surfaces. HDDs continue to be the primary medium of mass data storage due to their performance attributes, reliability, high capacities, superior quality and cost effectiveness. Complementing HDD storage architectures, SSDs use NAND flash memory integrated circuit assemblies to store data.

Our HDD products are designed for mass capacity storage and legacy markets. Mass capacity storage involves well-established use cases—such as hyperscale data centers and public clouds as well as emerging use cases. Legacy markets are those that we continue to sell to but we do not plan to invest in significantly. Our HDD and SSD product portfolio includes Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (“SATA”), Serial Attached SCSI (“SAS”) and Non-Volatile Memory Express (“NVMe”) based designs to support a wide variety of mass capacity and legacy applications.

Our systems portfolio includes storage subsystems for enterprises, cloud service providers (“CSPs”), scale-out storage servers and original equipment manufacturers (“OEMs”). Engineered for modularity, mobility, capacity and performance, these solutions include our enterprise HDDs and SSDs, enabling customers to integrate powerful, scalable storage within existing environments or create new ecosystems from the ground up in a secure, cost-effective manner.

Our Lyve portfolio provides a simple, cost-efficient and secure way to manage massive volumes of data across the distributed enterprise. The Lyve platform includes a shuttle solution that enables enterprises to transfer massive amounts of data from endpoints to the core cloud and a storage-as-a-service cloud offering that provides frictionless mass capacity storage at the metro edge.

Industry Overview

Data Storage Industry

The data storage industry includes companies that manufacture components or subcomponents designed for data storage devices, as well as providers of storage solutions, software and services for enterprise cloud, big data, computing platforms and consumer markets. The rapid growth of data generation and the intelligent application of data are driving demand for data storage. As more data is created at endpoints outside traditional data centers, which requires processing at the edge and in the core or cloud, the need for data storage and management between the edge and cloud has also increased. Use cases include connected and autonomous vehicles, smart manufacturing and smart cities. We believe the proliferation and personal creation of media-rich digital content, further enabled by fifth-generation wireless (“5G”) technology, the edge, the Internet of Things (“IoT”), machine learning (“ML”) and artificial intelligence (“AI”), will continue to create demand for higher capacity storage solutions. The resulting mass data ecosystem is expected to require increasing amounts of data storage at the edge, in the core and in between.

Markets

The principal data storage markets include:

Mass Capacity Storage Markets

Mass capacity storage supports high capacity, low-cost per terabyte (“TB”) storage applications, including nearline, video and image applications (“VIA”) and network-attached storage (“NAS”) and edge-to-cloud data storage infrastructures.

Nearline.Nearline applications require mass capacity devices and mass capacity subsystems that provide end-to-end solutions to businesses for the purpose of modular and scalable storage. Enterprise storage applications require both high-capacity and energy efficient storage devices to support low total cost of ownership. Seagate systems offer mass capacity storage solutions that provide foundational infrastructure for public and private clouds. The nearline market includes storage for cloud computing, content delivery, archival, backup services and emerging use cases such as generative AI.

VIA and NAS. VIA and NAS drives are specifically designed to ensure the appropriate performance and reliability of the system for video analytics and camera enabled environments or network storage environments. These markets include storage for security and smart video installations.

Edge-to-cloud data storage infrastructures, transport, and activation of mass data. The Seagate Lyve portfolio grew out of our mass capacity storage portfolio. It provides a simple, cost-efficient and secure way to manage, transport and activate massive volumes of data across the distributed enterprise. Among other elements, the Lyve portfolio includes a shuttle solution that enables enterprises to transfer vast amounts of data from endpoints to the core cloud and a storage-as-a-service cloud that provides frictionless mass capacity storage at the metro edge.

Legacy Markets

Legacy markets include consumer, client and mission critical applications. We continue to sell to these markets but do not plan significant additional investment.

Consumer storage. Consumer applications are externally connected storage, both HDD and SSD-based, used to provide backup capabilities, augmented storage capacity, or portable storage for PCs, mobile devices and gaming consoles.

Client storage. Client applications include desktop and notebook storage that rely on low cost-per-HDD and SSD devices to provide built-in storage, digital video recorder (“DVR”) storage for video streaming in always-on consumer premise equipment and media center, and gaming storage for PC-based gaming systems as well as console gaming applications including both internal and external storage options.

Mission critical storage. Mission critical applications are defined as those that use very high-performance enterprise class HDDs and SSDs with sophisticated firmware to reliably support very high workloads. We expect that enterprises utilizing dedicated storage area networks will continue to drive market demand for mission critical enterprise storage solutions.

Participants in the data storage industry include:

Major subcomponent manufacturers. Companies that manufacture components or subcomponents used in data storage devices or solutions include companies that supply spindle motors, heads and media, and application specific integrated circuits (“ASICs”).

Storage device manufacturers. Companies that transform components into storage products include disk drive manufacturers and semiconductor storage manufacturers that integrate flash memory into storage products such as SSDs.

Storage solutions manufacturers and system integrators. Companies, such as Original Equipment Manufacturers (“OEMs”), that bundle and package storage solutions, distributors that integrate storage hardware and software into end-user applications, CSPs that provide cloud based solutions to businesses for the purpose of scale-out storage solutions and modular systems, and producers of solutions such as storage racks.

Hyperscale data centers. Large hyperscale data center companies, many of which are CSPs, are increasingly designing their own storage subsystems and having them built by contract manufacturers for their own data centers. This trend is reshaping the storage system and subsystem market, driving both innovation in system design and changes in the competitive landscape of large storage system vendors.

Storage services. Companies that provide and host services and solutions, which include storage, backup, archiving, recovery and discovery of data.

Demand for Data Storage

In the “Worldwide Global DataSphere Forecast, 2023-2027”, published by the International Data Corporation (“IDC”), the global datasphere is forecasted to grow from 106 zettabytes in 2022 to 291 zettabytes by 2027. According to IDC, we are in a new era of the Data Age, whereby data is shifting to both the core and the edge. By 2027, nearly 71% of the world’s data will be generated in the core and edge, up from 54% in 2022. Digital transformation has given rise to many new applications, all of which rely on faster access to and secure storage of data proliferating from endpoints through edge to cloud, which we expect will have a positive impact on storage demand.

As more applications require real-time decision making, some data processing and storage is moving closer to the network edge. We believe this will result in a buildup of private and edge cloud environments that will enable fast and secure access to data throughout the IoT ecosystem.

Factors contributing to the growth of digital content include:

• Creation, sharing and consumption of media-rich content, such as high-resolution photos, high definition videos and digital music through smart phones, tablets, digital cameras, personal video cameras, DVRs, gaming consoles or other digital devices;

• Increasing use of video and imaging sensors to collect and analyze data used to improve traffic flow, emergency response times and manufacturing production costs, as well as for new security surveillance systems that feature higher resolution digital cameras and thus require larger data storage capacities;

• Creation and collection of data through the development and evolution of the IoT ecosystem, big data analytics, machine learning and new technology trends such as autonomous vehicles and drones, smart manufacturing, and smart cities, as well as emerging trends that converge the digital and physical worlds such as the metaverse, use of digital twins or generative AI;

• The growing use of analytics, especially for action on data created at the edge instead of processing and analyzing at the data center, which is particularly important for verticals such as autonomous vehicles, property monitoring systems, and smart manufacturing;

• Cloud migration initiatives and the ongoing advancement of the cloud, including the build out of large numbers of cloud data centers by CSPs and private companies transitioning on-site data centers into the cloud; and

• Need for protection of increased digital content through redundant storage on backup devices and externally provided storage services.

As a result of these factors, we anticipate that the nature and volume of data being created will require greater storage capability, which is more efficiently and economically facilitated by higher capacity mass storage solutions.

In addition, the economics of storage infrastructure are also evolving. The utilization of public and private hyperscale storage and open-source solutions is reducing the total cost of ownership of storage while increasing the speed and efficiency with which customers can leverage massive computing and storage devices. Accordingly, we expect these trends will continue to create significant demand for data storage products and solutions going forward.

Demand Trends

We believe that continued growth in digital content creation will require increasingly higher storage capacity in order to store, aggregate, host, distribute, analyze, manage, protect, back up and use such content. We also believe that as architectures evolve to serve a growing commercial and consumer user base throughout the world, storage solutions will evolve as well.

Mass capacity is and will continue to be the enabler of scale. We expect increased data creation will lead to the expansion of the need for storage in the form of HDDs, SSDs and systems. While the advance of solid state technology in many end markets is expected to increase, we believe that in the foreseeable future, cloud, edge and traditional enterprise which require high-capacity storage solutions will be best served by HDDs due to their ability to deliver reliable, energy-efficient and the most cost effective mass storage devices. We also believe that as HDD capacities continue to increase, a focus exclusively on unit demand does not reflect the increase in demand for exabytes. As demand for higher capacity drives increases, the demand profile has shifted to reflect fewer total HDD units, but with higher average capacity per drive and higher overall exabyte demand.

Industry Supply Balance

From time to time, the storage industry has experienced periods of imbalance between supply and demand. To the extent that the storage industry builds or maintains capacity based on expectations of demand that do not materialize, price erosion may become more pronounced. Conversely, during periods where demand exceeds supply, price erosion is generally muted.

Our Business

Data Storage Technologies

The design and manufacturing of HDDs depends on highly advanced technology and manufacturing techniques. Therefore, it requires high levels of research and development spending and capital equipment investments. We design, fabricate and assemble a number of the most important components in our disk drives, including read/write heads and recording media. Our design and manufacturing operations are based on technology platforms that are used to produce various disk drive products that serve multiple data storage applications and markets. Our core technology platforms focus on the areal density of media and read/write head technologies, including innovations like shingled-magnetic-recording ("SMR") technology, the high-capacity enabling heat-assisted magnetic recording (“HAMR”) technology, and the throughput-optimizing multi actuator MACH.2 technology. This design and manufacturing approach allows us to deliver a portfolio of storage products to service a wide range of data storage applications and industries.

Disk drives that we manufacture are commonly differentiated by the following key characteristics:

• input/output operations per second (“IOPS”), commonly expressed in megabytes per second, which is the maximum number of reads and writes to a storage location;

• storage capacity, commonly expressed in TB, which is the amount of data that can be stored on the disk drive;

• spindle rotation speed, commonly expressed in revolutions per minute (“RPM”), which has an effect on speed of access to data;

• interface transfer rate, commonly expressed in megabytes per second, which is the rate at which data moves between the disk drive and the computer controller;

• average seek time, commonly expressed in milliseconds, which is the time needed to position the heads over a selected track on the disk surface;

• data transfer rate, commonly expressed in megabytes per second, which is the rate at which data is transferred to and from the disk drive;

• product quality and reliability, commonly expressed in annualized return rates; and

• energy efficiency, commonly measured by the power output such as energy per TB necessary to operate the disk drive.

Areal density is measured by storage capacity per square inch on the recording surface of a disk. The storage capacity of a disk drive is determined by the size and number of disks it contains as well as the areal density capability of these disks.

We also offer SSDs as part of our storage solutions portfolio. Our portfolio includes devices with SATA, SAS and NVMe interfaces. The SSDs differ from HDDs in that they are without mechanical parts.

SSDs store data on NAND flash memory cells, or metal-oxide semiconductor transistors using a charge on a capacitor to represent a binary digit. SSD technology offers fast access to data and robust performance. SSDs complement hyperscale

applications, high-density data centers, cloud environments and web servers. They are also used in mission-critical enterprise applications, consumer, gaming and NAS applications.

Manufacturing

We primarily design and manufacture our own read/write heads and recording media, which are critical technologies for disk drives. This integrated approach enables us to lower costs and to improve the functionality of components so that they work together efficiently.

We believe that because of our vertical design and manufacturing strategy, we are well positioned to take advantage of the opportunities to leverage the close interdependence of components for disk drives. Our manufacturing efficiency and flexibility are critical elements of our integrated business strategy. We continuously seek to improve our manufacturing efficiency and reduce manufacturing costs by:

• employing manufacturing automation;

• employing machine learning algorithms and AI;

• improving product quality and reliability;

• integrating our supply chain with suppliers and customers to enhance our demand visibility and reduce our working capital requirements;

• coordinating between our manufacturing group and our research and development organization to rapidly achieve volume manufacturing; and

• operating our facilities at optimal capacities.

A vertically integrated model, however, tends to have less flexibility when demand declines as it exposes us to higher unit costs when capacity utilization is not optimized which would lead to factory underutilization charges as we experienced in fiscal year 2023.

Components and Raw Materials

Disk drives incorporate certain components, including a head disk assembly and a printed circuit board mounted to the head disk assembly, which are sealed inside a rigid base and top cover containing the recording components in a contamination-controlled environment. We maintain a highly integrated approach to our business by designing and manufacturing a significant portion of the components we view as critical to our products, such as read/write heads and recording media.

Read/Write Heads. The function of the read/write head is to scan across the disk as it spins, magnetically recording or reading information. The tolerances of read/write heads are extremely demanding and require state-of-the-art equipment and processes. Our read/write heads are manufactured with thin-film and photolithographic processes similar to those used to produce semiconductor integrated circuits, though challenges related to magnetic film properties and topographical structures are unique to the disk drive industry. We perform all primary stages of design and manufacture of read/write heads at our facilities. We use a combination of internally manufactured and externally sourced read/write heads, the mix of which varies based on product mix, technology and our internal capacity levels.

Media. Data is written to or read from the media, or disk, as it rotates at very high speeds past the read/write head. The media is made from non-magnetic substrates, usually an aluminum alloy or glass and is coated with thin layers of magnetic materials. We use a combination of internally manufactured and externally sourced finished media and aluminum substrates, the mix of which varies based on product mix, technology and our internal capacity levels. We purchase all of our glass substrates from third parties.

Printed Circuit Board Assemblies. The printed circuit board assemblies (“PCBAs”) are comprised of standard and custom ASICs and ancillary electronic control chips. The ASICs control the movement of data to and from the read/write heads and through the internal controller and interface, which communicates with the host computer. The ASICs and control chips form electronic circuitry that delivers instructions to a head positioning mechanism called an actuator to guide the heads to the selected track of a disk where the data is recorded or retrieved. Disk drive manufacturers use one or more industry standard interfaces such as SATA, SCSI, or SAS to communicate to the host systems.

Head Disk Assembly. The head disk assembly consists of one or more disks attached to a spindle assembly powered by a spindle motor that rotates the disks at a high constant speed around a hub. Read/write heads, mounted on an arm assembly, similar in concept to that of a record player, fly extremely close to each disk surface, and record data on and retrieve it from concentric tracks in the magnetic layers of the rotating disks. The read/write heads are mounted vertically on an E-shaped assembly (“E-block”) that is actuated by a voice-coil motor to allow the heads to move from track to track. The E-block and the

recording media are mounted inside the head disk assembly. We purchase spindle motors from outside vendors and from time to time participate in the design of the motors that go into our products.

Disk Drive Assembly. Following the completion of the head disk assembly, it is mated to the PCBA, and the completed unit goes through extensive defect mapping and machine learning prior to packaging and shipment. Disk drive assembly and machine learning operations occur primarily at our facilities located in China and Thailand. We perform subassembly and component manufacturing operations at our facilities in China, Malaysia, Northern Ireland, Singapore, Thailand and the United States.

Contract Manufacturing. We outsource the manufacturing and assembly of certain components and products to third parties in various countries worldwide. This includes outsourcing the PCBAs used in our disk drives, SSDs and storage subsystems. We continue to participate in the design of our components and products, and we are directly involved in qualifying key suppliers and components used in our products.

Suppliers of Components and Industry Constraints. There are a limited number of independent suppliers of components, such as recording heads and media, available to disk drive manufacturers. From time to time, we may enter into long-term supply arrangements with these independent suppliers. Vertically integrated disk drive manufacturers like us, who manufacture their own components, are less dependent on external component suppliers than less vertically integrated disk drive manufacturers. However, certain parts of our business have been adversely affected by our suppliers’ capacity constraints and this could occur again in the future.

Commodity and Other Manufacturing Costs. The production of disk drives requires rare earth elements, precious metals, scarce alloys and industrial commodities, which are subject to fluctuations in price and the supply of which has at times been constrained. In addition to increased costs of components and commodities, volatility in fuel and other transportation costs may also increase our costs related to commodities, manufacturing and freight. As a result, we may increase our use of alternative shipment methods to help offset any increase in freight costs, and we will continually review various forms of shipments and routes in order to minimize the exposure to higher freight costs.

Products

We offer a broad range of storage solutions for mass capacity storage and legacy applications. We differentiate products on the basis of capacity, performance, product quality, reliability, price, form factor, interface, power consumption efficiency, security features and other customer integration requirements. Our industry is characterized by continuous and significant advances in technology that contribute to rapid product life cycles. Currently our product offerings include:

Mass Capacity Storage

Enterprise Nearline HDDs. Our high-capacity enterprise HDDs ship in capacities of up to 30TB. These products are designed for mass capacity data storage in the core and at the edge, as well as server environments and cloud systems that require high capacity, enterprise reliability, energy efficiency and integrated security. They are available in SATA and SAS interfaces. Additionally, certain customers can utilize many of our HDDs with Shingled Magnetic Recording (“SMR”) technology enabled which increases the available storage capacity of the drive with certain performance trade-offs.

Enterprise Nearline SSDs. Our enterprise SSDs are designed for high-performance, hyperscale, high-density and cloud applications. They are offered with multiple interfaces, including SAS, SATA, and NVMe and in capacities up to 15TB.

Enterprise Nearline Systems. Our systems portfolio provides modular storage arrays, storage server platforms, multi-level configuration for disks (commonly referred as JBODs) and expansion shelves to expand and upgrade data center storage infrastructure and other enterprise applications. They feature speed, scalability and security. Our capacity-optimized systems feature multiple scalable configurations and can accommodate up to 96 26TB drives per chassis. We offer capacity and performance-optimized systems that include all-flash, all-disk and hybrid arrays for workloads demanding high performance, capacity and efficiency.

VIA. Our video and image HDDs are built to support the high-write workload of an always-on, always-recording video systems. These optimized drives are built to support the growing needs of the video imaging market with support for multiple streams and capacities up to 24TB.

NAS. Our NAS drives are built to support the performance and reliability demanded by small and medium businesses, and incorporate interface software with custom-built health management, error recovery controls, power settings and vibration tolerance. Our NAS HDD solutions are available in capacities up to 24TB. We also offer NAS SSDs with capacities up to 4TB.

Legacy Applications

Mission Critical HDDs and SSDs. We continue to support 10,000 and 15,000 RPM HDDs, offered in capacities up to 2.4TB, which enable increased throughput while improving energy efficiency. Our enterprise SSDs are available in capacities up to 15TB, with endurance options up to 10 drive writes per day and various interfaces. Our SSDs deliver the speed and consistency required for demanding enterprise storage and server applications.

Consumer Solutions. Our external storage solutions, with capacities up to 20TB are shipped, under the Seagate Ultra Touch, One Touch, Expansion and Basics product lines, as well as under the LaCie brand name. We strive to deliver the best customer experience by leveraging our core technologies, offering services such as Seagate Recovery Services (data recovery) and partnering with leading brands such as Microsoft’s Xbox, Sony’s PlayStation and Disney’s Star Wars and Marvel.

Client Applications. Our 3.5-inch desktop drives offer up to 8TB of capacity, designed for personal computers and workstation applications and our 2.5-inch notebook drives offer up to 5TB for HDD and up to 2TB for SSD designed for applications such as traditional notebooks, convertible systems and external storage to address a range of performance needs and sizes for affordable, high-capacity storage. Our DVR HDDs are optimized for video streaming in always-on consumer premise equipment applications with capacities up to 8TB. Ourgaming SSDs are specifically optimized internal storage for gaming rigs and are designed to enhance the gaming experience during game load and game play with capacities up to 4TB for SSD.

Lyve Edge-to-Cloud Mass Capacity Platform

Lyve. Lyve is our platform built with mass data in mind. These solutions, including modular hardware and software, deliver a portfolio that streamlines data access, transport and management for today’s enterprise.

Cloud. Lyve Cloud storage-as-a-service platform is an S3-compatible storage-only cloud designed to allow enterprises to unlock the value of their massive unstructured datasets. We collaborate with certain partners to maximize accessibility and provide extensive interconnect opportunities for additional cloud services and geographical expansion.

Data Services. Lyve Mobile Data Transfer Services consists of Lyve Mobile modular and scalable hardware, purpose-built for simple and secure mass-capacity edge data storage, lift-and-shift initiatives, and other data movement for the enterprise. These products are cloud-vendor agnostic and can be integrated seamlessly with public or private cloud data centers and providers.

Customers

We sell our products to major OEMs, distributors and retailers.

OEM customers, including large hyperscale data center companies and CSPs, typically enter into master purchase agreements with us. Deliveries are scheduled only after receipt of purchase orders. In addition, with limited lead-time, customers may defer most purchase orders without significant penalty. Anticipated orders from our customers have in the past failed to materialize or OEM delivery schedules have been deferred or altered as a result of changes in their business needs.

Our distributors generally enter into non-exclusive agreements for the resale of our products. They typically furnish us with a non-binding indication of their near-term requirements and product deliveries are generally scheduled accordingly. The agreements and related sales programs typically provide the distributors with limited rights of return and price protection. In addition, we offer sales programs to distributors on a quarterly and periodic basis to promote the sale of selected products in the sales channel.

Our retail channel consists of our branded storage products sold to retailers either by us directly or by our distributors. Retail sales made by us or our distributors typically require greater marketing support, sales incentives and price protection periods.

See “Item 8. Financial Statements and Supplementary Data—Note 16. Business Segment and Geographic Information” contained in this report for a description of our major customers.

Competition

We compete primarily with manufacturers of hard drives used in the mass capacity storage and legacy markets, and with other companies in the data storage industry that provide SSDs and systems. Some of the principal factors used by customers to differentiate among data storage solutions manufacturers are storage capacity, product performance, product quality and reliability, price per unit and price per TB, storage/retrieval access times, data transfer rates, form factor, product warranty and support capabilities, supply continuity and flexibility, power consumption, total cost of ownership and brand. While different markets and customers place varying levels of emphasis on these factors, we believe that our products are competitive with respect to many of these factors in the markets that we currently compete in.

Principal Competitors. We compete with manufacturers of storage solutions and the other principal manufacturers in the data storage solution industry including:

• Micron Technology, Inc.;

• Samsung Electronics;

• SK hynix, Inc.;

• Kioxia Holdings Corporation;

• Toshiba Corporation; and

• Western Digital Corporation, operating the Western Digital, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies and SanDisk brands.

Price Erosion. Historically, our industry has been characterized by price declines for data storage products with comparablecapacity, performance and feature sets (“like-for-like products”). Price declines for like-for-like products (“price erosion”) tend to be more pronounced during periods of:

• economic contraction in which competitors may use discounted pricing to attempt to maintain or gain market share;

• few new product introductions when competitors have comparable or alternative product offerings; and

• industry supply exceeding demand.

Data storage manufacturers typically attempt to offset price erosion with an improved mix of data storage products characterized by higher capacity, better performance and additional feature sets and product cost reductions.

We believe the HDD industry, in the prevailing supply and demand environment, experienced higher than usual price erosion in fiscal year 2023 and modest price erosion in fiscal year 2022.

Product Life Cycles and Changing Technology. Success in our industry has been dependent to a large extent on the ability to balance the introduction and transition of new products with time-to-volume, performance, capacity and quality metrics at a competitive price, level of service and support that our customers expect. Generally, the drive manufacturer that introduces a new product first benefits from improved product mix, favorable profit margins and less pricing pressure until comparable products are introduced. Changing technology also necessitates on-going investments in research and development, which may be difficult to recover due to rapid product life cycles or economic declines. Further, there is a continuing need to successfully execute product transitions and new product introductions, as factors such as quality, reliability and manufacturing yields continue to be of significant competitive importance.

Cyclicality and Seasonality

Our mass capacity markets are subject to variability of sales, which can be attributed to the timing of IT spending or a reflection of cyclical demand from CSPs based on the timing of their procurement and deployment requirements and their ability to procure other components needed to build out data center infrastructure. Our legacy markets, such as consumer storage applications, traditionally experienced seasonal variability in demand with higher levels of demand in the first half of the fiscal year, primarily driven by consumer spending related to back-to-school season and traditional holiday shopping season.

Research and Development

We are committed to developing new component technologies, products, alternative storage technologies inclusive of systems, software and other innovative technology solutions to support emerging applications in data use and storage. Our research and development activities are designed to bring new products to market in high volume, with quality attributes that our customers expect, before our competitors. Part of our product development strategy is to leverage a design platform and/or subsystem within product families to serve different market needs. This platform strategy allows for more efficient resource utilization, leverages best design practices, reduces exposure to changes in demand, and allows for achievement of lower costs through purchasing economies of scale. Our advanced technology integration effort, such as our high-capacity enabling HAMR technology, focuses disk drive and component research on recording subsystems, including read/write heads and recording media; market-specific product technology; and technology we believe may lead to new business opportunities. The primary purpose of our advanced technology integration effort is to ensure timely availability of mature component technologies for our product development teams as well as to allow us to leverage and coordinate those technologies in the design centers across our products in order to take advantage of opportunities in the marketplace.

Patents and Licenses

As of June 30, 2023, we had approximately 4,200 U.S. patents and 450 patents issued in various foreign jurisdictions as well as approximately 350 U.S. and 100 foreign patent applications pending. The number of patents and patent applications will vary at any given time as part of our ongoing patent portfolio management activity. Due to the rapid technological change that characterizes the data storage industry, we believe that, in addition to patent protection, the improvement of existing products, reliance upon trade secrets, protection of unpatented proprietary know-how and development of new products are also important to our business in establishing and maintaining a competitive advantage. Accordingly, we intend to continue our efforts to broadly protect our intellectual property, including obtaining patents, where available, in connection with our research and development program.

The data storage industry is characterized by significant litigation arising from time to time relating to patent and other intellectual property rights. From time to time, we receive claims that our products infringe patents of third parties. Although we have been able to resolve some of those claims or potential claims without a material adverse effect on us, other claims have resulted in adverse decisions or settlements. In addition, other claims are pending, which if resolved unfavorably to us could have a material adverse effect on our business and results of operations. For more information on these claims, see “Item 8. Financial Statements and Supplementary Data—Note 14.Legal, Environmental and Other Contingencies.” The costs of engaging in intellectual property litigation in the past have been, and in the future may be, substantial, irrespective of the merits of the claim or the outcome.

Environmental Matters

Our operations are subject to laws and regulations in the various jurisdictions in which we operate relating to the protection of the environment, including those governing discharges of pollutants into the air and water, the management and disposal of hazardous substances and wastes and the cleanup of contaminated sites. Some of our operations require environmental permits and controls to prevent and reduce air and water pollution, and these permits are subject to modification, renewal and revocation by issuing authorities.

We have established environmental management systems and continually update environmental policies and standard operating procedures for our operations worldwide. We believe that our operations are in material compliance with applicable environmental laws, regulations and permits. We budget for operating and capital costs on an ongoing basis to comply with environmental laws. If additional or more stringent requirements are imposed on us in the future, we could incur additional operating costs and capital expenditures.

Some environmental laws, such as the U.S. Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act of 1980 (as amended, the “Superfund” law) and its state equivalents, can impose liability for the cost of cleanup of contaminated sites upon any of the current or former site owners or operators or upon parties who sent waste to these sites, regardless of whether the owner or operator owned the site at the time of the release of hazardous substances or the lawfulness of the original disposal activity. We have been identified as a responsible or potentially responsible party at several sites. Based on current estimates of cleanup costs and our expected allocation of these costs, we do not expect costs in connection with these sites to be material.

We may be subject to various state, federal and international laws and regulations governing environmental matters, including those restricting the presence of certain substances in electronic products. For example, the European Union (“EU”) enacted the Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment (2011/65/EU), which prohibits the use of certain substances, including lead, in certain products, including disk drives and server storage

products, put on the market after July 1, 2006. Similar legislation has been or may be enacted in other jurisdictions, including in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Taiwan, China and Japan. The EU REACH Directive (Registration, Evaluation, Authorization, and Restriction of Chemicals, EC 1907/2006) also restricts substances of very high concern in products. If we or our suppliers fail to comply with the substance restrictions, recycle requirements or other environmental requirements as they are enacted worldwide, it could have a materially adverse effect on our business.

Social and Employee Matters

As of June 30, 2023, we employed approximately 33,400 employees and temporary employees worldwide, of which approximately 27,100 were located in our Asia operations. We believe that our employees are crucial to our current success and that our future success will depend, in part, on our ability to attract, retain and further motivate qualified employees at all levels. We believe that our employee relations are good.

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion. One of our core values is inclusion. We rely on our diverse workforce to develop, deliver and sustain our business strategy and achieve our goals. One way we embrace our diverse employees and promote a culture of inclusion is through the support of employee resource groups (“ERG”). These voluntary, employee-led communities are built on a shared diversity of identity, experience or thought and provide a number of benefits to employees, including professional and leadership development. Seagate’s ERG community encompasses a wide array of diversity, such as LGBTQ+, women, people of color and interfaith, and includes over 27 chapters across seven countries. We also support inclusion through active employee communications, unconscious bias education and ongoing efforts to ensure our employees feel safe, respected and welcomed. In January 2023, we published our fourth annual Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (“DEI”) Report, which provides an overview of our DEI efforts and outcomes including demographics on our workforce. The fiscal year 2022 DEI Report is available on our website.

Health & Safety. All our manufacturing sites have health and safety management systems certified to the International Organization for Standardization (“ISO”) 45001. In addition, we are audited to health and safety standards set forth by the Responsible Business Alliance. Our global health and safety standards, as well as our accompanying Environment, Health and Safety (“EHS”) management systems, frequently go beyond country or industry-level guidelines to ensure that we keep our employees healthy and safe. We regularly host health and safety regulatory visits that focus on issues such as safety, radiation, fire codes, food and transportation. Through our EHS Management Systems, we ensure that the focus remains on the continuous improvement of employee health and safety programs. We continue to provide comprehensive health and safety training to our employees. We emphasize e-learning courses as our main vehicle for delivering such training because employees can learn at their own pace.

Development, Retention, Compensation, Benefits & Engagement. Our performance management system is a continuous process that helps team members focus on the right priorities. Meaningful conversations between managers and employees are the foundation of performance management at Seagate. We focus on dialogue centered around manager and employee conversations, and ongoing feedback, to align goals. This approach focuses on achieving high-quality productive dialogue between managers and employees. We also encourage our employees to participate in the many learning opportunities that are available at Seagate. The portfolio of learning and training formats include but are not limited to mentoring and coaching, e-learning opportunities, LinkedIn Learning classroom training, on-the-job training and other strategic internal programs that cover topics ranging from leadership and technical skills to health, safety and the environment. In addition, we are investing in upskilling and re-deploying employees as needed to support our future growth and respond to the changing demands of the business. For example, our internal mobility and career development tool provides Seagate employees the opportunity to establish networking and mentor connections, identify and participate in internal part-time projects, and explore internal full-time positions.

Our Total Rewards program is designed to attract, motivate and retain talented people in order to successfully meet our business goals. The program generally includes base pay, annual bonuses, commissions, equity awards, an employee stock purchase plan, retirement savings opportunities and other employee health and wellness benefits. Our compensation programs and guidelines are structured to align pay with performance and aim to provide internally and externally competitive total compensation.

Employee engagement is the psychological commitment and passion that drives discretionary effort. It predicts individual performance and is the measure of the relationship between employees and the Company. Our engagement survey includes facets of the employee experience throughout the employee life cycle. Employee experience is what employees encounter and observe over the course of their career at Seagate. A positive employee experience can have an impact on everything from recruiting to Seagate's bottom line.

In fiscal year 2023, we conducted two pulse surveys to obtain feedback from our global employees on their experience at Seagate. Following the conclusion of the surveys, leaders were provided access to a dashboard with results that shared the key drivers of engagement specific to their own department.

Giving Back. Our community engagement program is designed to provide support to our local communities, with an emphasis on science, technology, engineering and mathematics (“STEM”) and also address health and human services, and environmental opportunities. The program is reflective of Seagate’s vertically integrated model, with multiple large facilities across EMEA, Asia and the United States. Accordingly, the program is highly localized, involving a cross-functional process to identify and execute on opportunities that are meaningful locally.

We maintain an emphasis on STEM, targeting K-12 students, supporting STEM efforts in a way that is age-appropriate and allows for fun as well as learning. In fiscal year 2023 we continued pivoting to virtual engagements and funding of STEM partners as they worked to deliver their programs online or in a socially distanced manner. Seagate also increased support of health & human services partnerships, such as support of food banks, clinics, and non-profit organizations, while sustaining many of our ongoing community partnerships.

Environmental, Social and Governance (“ESG”) Performance Report

Additional information regarding our ESG commitment and progress can be found on the ESG section of our website and in our ESG Performance Report. Information contained on our website or in our annual ESG Performance Report is not incorporated by reference into this or any other report we filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Financial Information

Financial information for our reportable business segment and about geographic areas is set forth in “Item 8. Financial Statements and Supplementary Data—Note 16. Business Segment and Geographic Information.”

Corporate Information

Seagate Technology Holdings public limited company is a public limited company organized under the laws of Ireland.

Available Information

Availability of Reports. We are a reporting company under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the “1934 Exchange Act”), and we file reports, proxy statements and other information with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”). Because we make filings to the SEC electronically, the public may access this information at the SEC's website: www.sec.gov. This site contains reports, proxy and information statements and other information regarding issuers that file electronically with the SEC.

Website Access. Our website is www.seagate.com. We make available, free of charge at the “Investor Relations” section of our website (investors.seagate.com), our Annual Reports on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K and amendments to those reports filed or furnished pursuant to Section 13(a) or 15(d) of the 1934 Exchange Act as soon as reasonably practicable after we electronically file such materials with, or furnish them to, the SEC. Reports of beneficial ownership filed pursuant to Section 16(a) of the 1934 Exchange Act are also available on our website.

Investors. Investors and others should note that we routinely use the Investor Relations section of our website to announce material information to investors and the marketplace. While not all of the information that the Company posts on its corporate website is of a material nature, some information could be deemed to be material. Accordingly, the Company encourages investors, the media and others interested in the Company to review the information that it shares on www.seagate.com. Information in, or that can be accessed through, our website is not incorporated into this Form 10-K.

Information About Our Executive Officers

The following sets forth the name, age and position of each of the persons who were serving as executive officers as of August 4, 2023. There are no family relationships among any of our executive officers.

Name

Age

Positions

Dr. William D. Mosley

56

Director and Chief Executive Officer

Gianluca Romano

54

Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer

Ban Seng Teh

57

Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer

Katherine E. Schuelke

60

Senior Vice President, Chief Legal Officer and Corporate Secretary

KianFatt Chong

60

Senior Vice President, Global Operations

Dr. John C. Morris

56

Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer

Dr. William D. Mosley, 56, has served as our Chief Executive Officer (“CEO”) since October 2017 and as a member of the Board since July 2017. He previously served as our President and Chief Operating Officer (“COO”) from June 2016 to September 2017. He also served as our President of Operations and Technology from October 2013 to June 2016 and as our Executive Vice President of Operations from March 2011 until October 2013. Prior to these positions, Dr. Mosley served as Executive Vice President, Sales and Marketing from February 2009 through March 2011; Senior Vice President of Global Disk Storage Operations from 2007 to 2009; and Vice President of Research and Development, Engineering from 2002 to 2007. He joined Seagate in 1996 as a Senior Engineer with a PhD in solid state physics. From 1996 to 2002, he served at Seagate in varying roles of increasing responsibility until his promotion to Vice President.

Gianluca Romano, 54, has served as our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer since January 2019. From October 2011 to December 2018, Mr. Romano served as Corporate Vice President, Business Finance and Accounting at Micron Technology, Inc (“Micron”), a producer of computer memory and computer data storage. Prior to his role at Micron, Mr. Romano served as Vice President Finance, Corporate Controller at Numonyx, Inc., a flash memory company which was acquired by Micron in February 2010, from 2008 to 2010. From 1994 until 2008, Mr. Romano held various finance positions at STMicroelectronics, an electronics and semiconductor manufacturer, most recently as Group Vice-President, Central & North Europe Finance Director, Shared Accounting Services Director.

Ban Seng Teh, 57, has served as our Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer since July 2022. Prior to that, Mr. Teh served as Executive Vice President of Global Sales and Sales Operations from February 2021 to July 2022 and Senior Vice President of Global Sales and Sales Operations from November 2014 to February 2021. Mr. Teh also served as our Senior Vice President of Asia-Pacific and Japan Sales and marketing from July 2010 to November 2014. Mr. Teh joined Seagate in 1989 as a field customer engineer and has served in varying roles of increasing responsibilities, including as Vice President, Asia Pacific Sales and Marketing (Singapore) from January 2008 to July 2010; Vice President, Sales Operations from 2006 to 2008; Vice President, Asia Pacific Sales from 2003 to 2006; Director, Marketing and APAC Distribution Sales from 1999 to 2003; and Country Manager, South Asia Sales from 1996 to 1999.

Katherine E. Schuelke, 60, has served as our Senior Vice President, Chief Legal Officer and Corporate Secretary since June 2017. From 2011 to January 2016, Ms. Schuelke was the Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary at Altera Corporation (“Altera”), a manufacturer of programmable logic devices. Prior to that, Ms. Schuelke was Vice President, General Counsel, and Secretary at Altera from 2001 to 2011. At Altera, she held other positions of increasing responsibility from 1996 through 2001. Ms. Schuelke began her career at an international law firm. Ms. Schuelke serves on the board of directors of SiTime Corporation, a provider of silicon timing solutions, and on its Compensation and Nominating and Corporate Governance Committees.

KianFatt Chong, 60, has served as our Senior Vice President, Global Operations since October 2020. Prior to his current role, Mr. Chong was Senior Vice President, Global Drive Operations from December 2013 to September 2020. He served as Vice President of China Operations from July 2003 to November 2013, expanding and also spearheading the first campus concept in Seagate with multiple manufacturing operations disciplines all located in a single site. Since joining Seagate in 1989 as an engineer, Mr. Chong has held a variety of leadership positions and has been a key strategic contributor for many Seagate’s operations and manufacturing capabilities across the global footprints.

Dr. John C. Morris, 56, has served as our Senior Vice President, HDD and SSD Products and Chief Technology Officer since 2019. Prior to his current role, Dr. Morris was the Vice President of HDD and SSD Products from August 2015 to August 2019. Before that, he served as Vice President of Design Engineering and Enterprise Development Group driving focus on technical and strategic alignment with enterprise and cloud customers from September 2013 to August 2015. Since joining the Company in 1996, Dr. Morris has held a variety of engineering leadership positions and has been a key contributor to many of Seagate’s core technologies.

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