<<Off Topic>> Bizarre memory technology...............
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From Page One of Electronic News:October 27, 1997 Issue
Is Magnetic Memory For Real?
By Gale Morrison
New York--A Russian emigre scientist brought a 128MB magnetic memory device to Electronic News' editorial office
here last week, demonstrated the leapfrogging non-volatile memory storing files via his Toshiba laptop, and with his
interpreter described the billion-dollar possibilities from this and other prototypes he has developed.
The scientist, Shimon Gendlin, may hold, in the sense of magnetic memory science available at prices anyone can afford, a
holy grail. He described the device as thin films of a combination of Cobalt and Gold over a polysilicon substrate; the "metal
spin transistors" he says can withstand 200 degrees Celsius temperatures and are produced with standard fabrication
equipment.
Strangely, U.S. researches into magnetic memory have never heard of Shimon Gendlin, or Kappa Numerics, the Israeli
R&D house for whom he worked. But, the fact that he, using technology that Kappa claims it owns, fabricated a 128MB
non-volatile part and is ready to sell these and more in OEM quantities for about $1,000 per Gigabyte drew near-gasps and
several incredulous statements.
The president of flash memory lead player SanDisk was aghast, and skeptical. Eli Harari likened this to "someone telling you
he can fly at one and a half times the speed of light." Dr. Daughton said, "God, I'd be surprised . . . That sounds about five
years ahead of where anybody is right now."
Until now, Dr. Gendlin says he was barred from speaking on his work under an injunction that Kappa Numerics obtained
from a Delaware court. Dr. Gendlin's own Coral Gables, Fla.-based attorneys last year convinced the court to lift the ban
and then the scientist filed the U.S. patent for it, he said.
Here Comes The Quantum
Dr. Gendlin says he is ready to commercialize this "Quantum" technology. Quantum is the term he uses, perhaps to avoid
using the term magnetic memory which would get closer to the words used in existing patents. The two principals of Kappa
Numerics to whom EN spoke were incensed by discussions of Dr. Gendlin commercializing the work, saying "everything he
says is incorrect" and that they would prosecute.
NRL researcher and magnetic memory expert Dr. Gary Prinz placed this device technology in perspective. The theory
behind it is "50 years or older" and this in fact was the way computers originally held data; he recalled purchasing (very
expensive) "DEC 11s, DEC 8s" in the 1960s which used magnetic, non-volatile memory. In the 1970s, semiconductor
memories altogether displaced magnetic memory because it was so much more practical to make in commercial volumes.
The government's funding in these magnetics therefore died down, and so did academic research and industry's engineering
of it.
Still, the NRL has projects ongoing at IBM, Motorola and Honeywell, he said, because the Department of Defense wants
that. Dr. Prinz has seen the interest and investment in magnetic memory become "fast and furious," a veritable "bee hive."
IBM recently purchased patents from a German concern and Watson researcher Bill Gallagher is leading Big Blue's charge
in the area. "Motorola (under Herb Goronkin in Phoenix) has the broadest investigation," he said, and Honeywell continues
to make special, extremely durable magnetic memories for its DoD customers, a fact Honeywell researcher Jerry Granley
confirmed. Non-Volatile Electronics of Minneapolis, under Jim Daughton, is a commerical spin-off from Honeywell.
Gendlin Holds The Patents
Nevertheless, U.S. patent numbers 5,673,220 (issued Sept. 1997), 5,602,791 (issued Feb. 1997) and 5,390,142 (issued
May 1995)--all three entitled "Memory Material and Method for its Manufacture"--list Shimon Gendlin of Jerusalem, Israel,
as their inventor and Kappa Numerics of Guiderland, and New York, N.Y., as their holding "agents." (It should be noted
that all three are accessible on the Web server that IBM maintains.) From his testimony and a glimpse of the injunction
paperwork, Dr. Gendlin was not in Kappa's employ when any of the patents were issued, but perhaps when they were
filed.
Once he demonstrated the 128MB device, Dr. Gendlin discussed the far-reaching implications like 200GB diskless hard
drives, 128MB of non-volatile memory embedded in logic processors, and super-resolution holographs that can be focused
off this material. The Quantum technology he attributed not just to himself but to "scientists in SVG" and said it "is based on
the new metal spin transistors and the recently-discovered magnetic quantum-optical effect in polycrystalline silicon."
The potential for this route to magnetic memory goes beyond the billions of dollars a company might sell in non-volatile
RAM made from it, he reiterated. The applications in display, of which he says he has prototypes, could mean notebook flat
panels with 240,000 pixels per square millimeter and, even wilder, holographic, 3-D images created by bouncing polarized
light off the material.
Oleg Tchernoukhin, Dr. Gendlin's interpreter and business manager, said one of Dr. Gendlin's companies, Compu-Technics,
will sell a prototype 3-inch module, that can be "stitched" together as is done with other flat panels, for about $400. As of
last week, he was looking into obtaining booth space at this fall's Comdex in Las Vegas.
Dr. Gendlin's holding companies, SVG Israel New Technology, Ltd., of which he is president, and Compu-Technics, of
which he is chairman of the board, are based in Westbury, Long Island. The companies' nascent marketing plans include
producing the memory chips on fab lines in Israel and Hungary and selling them to OEMs worldwide, but they are "very
open" and "flexible," Mr. Tchernourkhin said. Dr. Gendlin said there is another patent pending, one filed in Sept. 1996, that
he filed himself and which gives him further rights.
The initials SVG are Dr. Gendlin's and the company bears no relation to Silicon Valley Group, the capital equipment maker.
From the foundation of his doctorates in Nuclear Physics and Computer Science (Physical Electronics) from universities in
Moscow and St. Petersburg, Russia, Dr. Gendlin emigrated to Israel in 1990 and began work at Kappa Numerics. Dr.
Prinz said Russian academe and industry kept up magnetic memory research long after the U.S., and in fact much of the
world's expertise came from there.
Here again, Dr. Gendlin's testimony takes another turn. He said Kappa Numerics sells its work exclusively to Intel.
In fact, Dr. Gendlin told EN, that not only was he the researcher behind Intel's new "StrataFlash" two-bit per cell memories
because he worked on that at Kappa, but that in 1993 he showed Intel worldwide manufacturing VP Mike Splinter his
work on Quantum and "Intel wanted it." Over what Kappa Numerics intended to do with the memory science, Dr. Gendlin
and Kappa "divorced," he said, and a breach of contract suit began, which culminated in the injunction.
Through a spokesman, Intel Israel head of operations Dov Froman said he had not heard of Kappa Numerics and Mr.
Splinter said Intel has "no relationship" with the company. Beyond that, the spokesman said, Intel did not "see the value in
getting involved" with Dr. Gendlin's testimony.
Dr. Gendlin said he also demonstrated the work to engineers at Philips Electronics in Eindhoven, Netherlands. Dr. Prinz said
that Philips had one of the finest magnetic memory research groups in the world, but "a year ago they shut it down. The
researchers pretty much dispersed, there's maybe one left."
Still, Kappa Numerics believes it holds the rights to Dr. Gendlin's work. "Anything related to what Shimon Gendlin talked to
you about, in all probability that is Kappa (Numerics) technology . . . Shimon Gendlin is not permitted to do anything with
our technology," Irwin Rosenthal, who is "a senior partner in a major law firm" and a "principal" in Kappa Numerics said
emphatically.
"Our law firm is Pennie and Edmonds. Have you heard of them?" Mr. Rosenthal demanded. "They are the best patent
attorneys in the world and they have been working with us for some time." He said Kappa had put the world's memory
manufacturers "on alert to Kappa's rights to that IP." |
