WD Names John Coyne Executive Vice President of Worldwide Operations

LAKE FOREST, Calif., June 13 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Western Digital Corp. today announced that John F. Coyne has been named executive vice president, worldwide operations. Coyne has been with WD for more than 20 years in a variety of senior manufacturing and operations management positions, helping the company establish its leadership position in the hard drive industry for quality and reliability in high-volume markets.

For the last several years, Coyne served as senior vice president, worldwide operations, with responsibility for hard drive manufacturing. Coyne now assumes additional responsibility for business operations, materials and magnetic head operations. He reports to Arif Shakeel, president and chief operating officer of WD.

"John Coyne has been and continues to be a major contributor to WD's success," said Shakeel. "His new position reflects the depth of our management team as we grow the business and address multiple new markets. John's energetic leadership and dedication have been instrumental in enabling WD to establish itself as a worldwide leader in the dynamic and demanding hard drive industry."

Coyne originally joined WD in 1983 to start the company's PCBA operations in his native Ireland. Based in Malaysia since 1997, he led the teams that developed WD's successful low-cost approach to hard drive manufacturing, the expansion of the company's drive operations into Thailand in 2002 and the acquisition and integration of magnetic head back-end operations in Thailand in 2003.

Throughout more than three decades in the electronics industry, he has held positions involving engineering, manufacturing, materials, marketing and general management. Coyne received his bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from University College Dublin.

About WD

WD, one of the storage industry's pioneers and long-time leaders, provides products and services for people and organizations that collect, manage and use digital information. The company produces reliable, high-performance hard drives that keep users' data close-at-hand and secure from loss.

WD was founded in 1970. The company's storage products are marketed to leading systems manufacturers and selected resellers under the Western Digital and WD brand names. Visit the Investor section of the company's Web site (http://www.westerndigital.com/) to access a variety of financial and investor information.

Western Digital is a registered trademark and WD and the Western Digital logo are trademarks of Western Digital Technologies, Inc. All other trademarks herein are property of their respective owner.

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