Western Digital to Target Japan Disk Market : Sales: The company expects a growing market there among computer makers for its new generation of hard drives, Chairman Roger Johnson says.

Western Digital Corp., the struggling maker of computer products, plans to target Japan as the market for a new generation of hard disk drives, the company’s chairman said Friday.

Chairman Roger W. Johnson said he expects the company’s sales to computer makers in Japan to grow as the industry switches to a new generation of smaller disk drives for portable computers.

“Japan is a large market with a lot of technology companies,” Johnson said. “We’re focusing on building long-term relationships with customers there. It’s obvious the next major opportunity for us in disk drives is in Japan.”

Disk drives, which store data on computers, account for roughly two-thirds of Western Digital’s $1 billion in annual revenue.

Johnson declined to comment on sales of disk drives to specific Japanese customers. Many such manufacturers are based in Japan.

Western Digital has been doing business in Japan since 1972. The company opened a Tokyo office, which now has 15 people, in 1985. The company’s larger customers include Toshiba Corp., NEC Corp. and IBM Japan.

Western Digital expects to sell about $44-million worth of semiconductor chips to Japanese companies for the 1992 fiscal year ending June 30, up from $38.9 million for the previous year. Johnson said his goal is to triple sales to Japan to about $150 million over the next several years with increased sales of disk drives.

Overall sales by disk-drive companies to Japan have been traditionally weak because the Japanese technology conglomerates often manufacture their own disk drives, said Phil Devin, an industry analyst at Dataquest Inc. in San Jose.

“If you have a strong relationship with a Japanese company, there is more opportunity,” Devin said. “But there aren’t many U.S. disk drive makers that do well there.”

But Johnson thinks that U.S. companies will be able to manufacture 1.8-inch disk drives--a new generation of disk drives that would be smaller and more efficient than current laptop drives--that Japanese companies will buy.

Western Digital lost $58.3 million for the six months ended Dec. 28, contrasted with a loss of $96.8 million for the year-earlier period. Revenue fell to $415.4 million, off 14% from $485.7 million the year before.

Western Digital expects to release its third-quarter financial results in the next two weeks. Johnson said the company’s financial restructuring plan, which calls for a return to profitability by the end of the fiscal year ending June 30, are on track.