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Technology Stocks : Micromem Technologies ***MAG-RAM*** ( MMTI) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: wily who wrote (60)	8/8/1999 9:37:00 AM
From: wily	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 95

This is a message I posted on the RMBS thread and will probably spam it around to other threads like IDTI, SSTI, AMD, INTC. Eventually, if I don't get enough response on SI I'll try RIT where there is a department of microelectronic engineering. Seems to me I could get a competent evaluation from someone there or they could refer me to someone who specializes in this kind of technology. Of course, monetary inducements would not be out of the question. ______________________________________________________________________ Can someone give me an assessment of this memory design and the chances it has of ever being manufactured? It is called MAG-RAM. I first came across it in this article in Scientific American: sciam.com It was patented in 1994 by Richard Lienau: 164.195.100.11. I believe this was an evolution of his original design patented in 1988: 164.195.100.11. A company called Micromem (BB MMTIE) was formed to promote and exploit the technology (so far its been all exploitation <g>). Here is their blurb on its usefulness, character and prospects: magramtm.com (Click on "Technology") The University of Utah is doing the development work through a two-year contract with the company (about $250,000) which ends this year. Earlier this year they claim to have achieved "proof of principle": reads and writes in a single memory cell and are soon to have an 8-bit working sample. It seems that the technology lay dormant for about 4 years between 1994 and 1998 while the inventor looked for ways to bring it to fruition. He says companies didn't want it because they didn't invent it themselves (NIH: Not Invented Here). Which is why the management of a defunct Canadian mining company was hired to see the project through (very rough synopsis). I know the budget, management, and all the other trappings surrounding the enterprise don't look especially promising, but a couple things stand out: The coverage by Scientific American (and more recently a very short piece in Popular Science) and the fact that the Lienau patent is mentioned in several subsequent patents by other companies/inventors such as Motorola and I think IBM. I'm wondering stuff like: How strong and unique is this patent? Is it something truly original or just one of a million possible variations on a theme (such as Hall Effect control of the magnetic field). For example the SciAm article mentions that Honeywell is working on a similar design. Is this technology already outdated? Afterall, it was originally conceived in 1988 and made no progress from 1994 to 1998. I'm just hoping to get a little perspective on this from a tech-enabled person.