AI Storage Beneficiaries' Executives Realize Millions in Stock Gains

At Western Digital Corp. (WDC), the CEO and other executives executed successive stock sales under their 10b5-1 plans in early February, realizing profits of tens of millions of dollars (equivalent to tens of billions of Korean won). Even after these transactions, each officer’s direct equity holdings remain valued between several hundred billion and several trillion Korean won, underscoring their continued material economic interest in the company.

Recently, Western Digital’s board approved an additional $4 billion share repurchase program—approximately KRW 5.3 trillion—and on February 3 in New York the company unveiled its AI data–centric HDD and storage roadmap at “Innovation Day 2026,” demonstrating a parallel focus on shareholder returns and growth strategy. Management is also slated to participate in key investor events, such as the Morgan Stanley TMT Conference on March 3, maintaining active external communications.

Western Digital is a U.S.–based data storage company offering both HDD and flash-based solutions, positioning the surge in large-scale data center demand driven by AI adoption as a core growth pillar. CEO Irving Tan has emphasized the company’s role as the backbone of the AI data economy built on its storage infrastructure, and has laid out a capital-allocation strategy that combines debt restructuring with share repurchases.