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

To: Derek C. who wrote (2404)	1/20/1998 4:23:00 AM
From: Tumbleweed	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 60323

Potential Competitor: Nanochip - Any comments? This is from Computergram on Jan 15th; computerwire.com Not a free service. NANOCHIP PROMISES NEW STORAGE TECHNOLOGY Nanochip Inc, a small twelve-man company from Oakland, California promises a revolutionary new chip-sized miniature storage media based on a combination of micromechnical and scanning-probe microscopy technology. Nanochip claims the new devices are faster than existing mass storage devices, have much lower power dissipation and can be produced at comparable cost to existing offerings. The system accesses data stored on magnetic media through mechanical read/write operation in a similar way to conventional disk drives but uses micromechanical arrays of tiny probes that harness electrostatic forces to move across the surface of the chip. The tiny distances involved help increase access speeds; the company claims an average latency of less than 500 microseconds . It says the devices will initially be capable of storing around 250 MB of data each and will be pushing the offering for use as a "hard disk drive on a chip" for notebook computers. A 1.7GB write-only version is also being developed as a potential replacement for CD-ROM drives. The chipset can be connected to the laptop via a card that plugs into the laptop via an IDE or SCSI interface. The company says other possible applications include multimedia products that currently rely on Flash memory storage such as digital cameras and camcorders. As with Flash memory, chips can be bonded together and cascaded, potentially giving them similar storage capacity to existing hard disk drives in a fraction of the space; each chip measures 18mm by 7mm by 1mm and weighs around 0.01 oz. Chief Financial Officer Tom Rust formed privately held Nanochip with President Joanne Culver in December 1996 but has been working on the underlying technology for the project for six years. While the company admits there are similar projects afoot, Nanochip claims it is the first to work on marrying the various technologies together. So far it has the micromechanical parts working and is currently testing them for their ability to withstand physical shock. Nanochip Inc says it has currently registered one patent and has further patents pending. Rust says the company is currently in negotiations with several semiconductor firms interested in fabricating the systems in volumes of "hundreds of millions" and says that it plans to launch its fir st batch of products sometime in early 1999, with a two chip set expected to cost around $50.