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Technology Stocks : WDC/Sandisk Corporation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Joe Zunic who wrote (1590)	11/14/1997 12:15:00 PM
From: Jerome Wittamer	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 60323

Sorry Joe, I do not know, at least I know that it is in the works since CFO doesn't wanna talk with anybody, this is what they call "the quiet period". Hopefully the stock is going up. To improve the knowledge of our thread from a historical point of view. Here's what my grandpa told me a very long time ago : December 02, 1996, Issue: 713 Section: Sourcing -- For Hardware & Software OEMs ---------------------------------------------------------------- N-Hand Puts It In Competition -- Iomega enters handheld arena By Kelly Spang Roy, Utah -- Expanding its removable-storage offerings, Iomega Corp. will now compete in the handheld-device arena, proposing a solution analysts said could drive down cost for these products. The Iomega technology, called "n-hand," is designed as a storage alternative for personal digital assistants (PDAs) N-hand is targeted as a low-cost, small form-factor storage, said Bill Tolson, marketing manager for Iomega's New Technologies division. The disks, which look similar to a floppy disk, will hold 20 Mbytes and are expected to cost less than $10, Tolson said. A single 20-Mbyte n-hand disk is expected to be about half the size of a business card. "If [n-hand] is as seamless as Iomega makes it sound," said Carl Holec, senior imaging products analyst for ARS Inc., Austin, Texas, "to incorporate it into a camera could have a substanial impact on where the pricing goes. [N-hand technology] could speed up the curve for the prices to come down." Iomega tested the n-hand storage solution in digital cameras and determined its technology can store as many as 80 images on a disk, Tolson said. Other low-end storage solutions may only hold between eight to 16 images, Holec said. While Roy-based Iomega only recently unveiled its n-hand disk, Tolson said the company is working with several OEMs to have the technology implemented into designs. Starting first with digital cameras, Tolson said he expects that by Christmas 1997, digital cameras will begin shipping with Iomega storage. Between now and September 1997, Tolson said product announcements will introduce devices with n-hand storage technology. There are other technologies against which Iomega must compete in this handheld-storage market-namely, flash memory. At Comdex/Fall, the Miniature Card Implementers Forum (MCIF) and CompactFlash Association demonstrated products. The 47 companies in the MCIF include Intel Corp., Philips Electronics Co. and Sharp Electronics Corp. There are about 57 companies in the CompactFlash Association, including SanDisk Corp. and Sony Corp. Flash-memory cards are expected to grow to 10,739 units shipped worldwide by 1999 from 1,566 units shipped in 1996, according to Disk/Trend Inc., Mountain View, Calif. However, flash memory can add as much as $400 to the price of a digital camera, Holec said. In the future, there may be an increase in capacity for n-hand disks, as well as greater versatility among devices. "It is our vision to have [n-hand technology] as a standardized format across devices," Tolson said. This means prices for CF will go down accelerating thus hurting SNDK's gross margins, at least thru '98. '99 is another story. The pictures gets clearer : more competition drives prices down. Consumer enjoy more affordable toys and buy what was then too expensive. This market is about to explode if these forces get to play as they did for centuries. Look at the sub-$1,000 PC market! Here we're talking toys at around $200. That's a couple of CDs and CD-ROMs. Market is huge when price is not an issue anymore. Clearly CF would win the battle given the capacity/price ratio in 2-3 years from now (notwithstanding the numerous other advantages of flash memory over click).