[ TeraStor ] PeterR1700, bhakta, Frank & Buddy
To: +jim wilkinson (21328 )
From: +PeterR1700
Jul 16 1997 7:00PM EST Reply #21339 of 21381
Jim - I've read your posts for several months now and appreciate your sobriety. This is VERY OFF POINT but was triggered by your computer crashing. I'm thinking about storage: two come to mind as an investment....Seagate and Quantum.
I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have re: same.
Peter
Peter,
I have neglected my duty long enough. I still don't have my archive back, so I went out did the research again, as I found the time.
I hope the following makes up for my lack of timing.
JW@KSC
TeraStor's first partner -Imation Corp. Imation, which is a spinoff of Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Co., already has announced that it will develop media for TeraStor's drives.
I found it interesting that Seagate already has a relationship with TeraStor Seagate has agreed to manufacture heads for TeraStor's drives.
TeraStor says its first products will store more than 20 gigabytes on one side of a disk platter. By today's standards, that's a huge amount.
TeraStor uses Near-field recording is actually a combination of several innovations. It takes technology from hard disks and it takes a tech from optical.
Optical drives read data with lasers, while hard-disk drives use a magnetic head. Combining these two storage methods is not new - the resulting drives are called magneto-optical.
But TeraStor has added some new twists.
TeraStor's drive shoots a laser through something called a solid immersion lens. This cuts the laser beam down, enabling it to read the most densely packed data.
The lens was first developed at Stanford University during research funded by both Sony & IBM. (Why am I not surprised)
TeraStor also has adopted a modified version of a flying head used in hard-disk drives. The head, which is designed to fly at a controlled distance from the disk platter, hasn't been built into magneto-optical drives before. This technology originally came from DEC , who sold it to disk drive maker Quantum in '94. Quantum has licensed the rights to TeraStor.
Another technology, which TeraStor calls ''first surface recording'' completes the picture. It lets you jam more data on the surface of the disk.
TeraStor appears to have excellent license protection and they seem to be in a strong position.
Management seems to be another of TeraStor's advantages.
Its chief executive and co-founder, James McCoy, was a major pioneer in the disk drive business. He helped start Milpitas, Quantum and Maxtor Corp.
Other Terastor executives also have many years of experience in the storage industry.
TeraStor has the confidence of the venture capital world. It has raised more than $30 million from investors including Quantum and several venture capital firms.
Short Executive Run Down
Mr. James McCoy is a co-founder of TeraStor and serves as the chairman and CEO. He has more than 25 years management and technology experience in disk, tape and optical storage. He is also co-founder of Maxtor and Quantum Corporations and has served on various public and private company board of directors.
Mr. McCoy holds a B.S. degree in industrial engineering and management from San Jose State University.
Dr. Gordon Knight is a co-founder of TeraStor and also co-founder of Maxoptix and Optimem Corporations.
Dr. Knight currently serves as TeraStor's chief technical officer. At Maxoptix, he was chief technical officer and later became acting president. Dr. Knight holds a B.S. degree in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Stanford University.
Amyl Ahola, Executive Vice President, COO
Mr. Amyl Ahola serves as TeraStor's executive vice president and chief operating officer. Prior to joining TeraStor, Mr. Ahola served in several capacities at Seagate Technology, including VP of corporate development, VP of marketing and VP of product line management. He was also president and CEO ofWangDAT, a DAT magnetic tape company, and of Optical Storage International (OSI), an optical storage technology company. Mr. Ahola holds a B.S. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Minnesota |
