Cartesian Data announces breakthrough in data storage technology for higher capacity, low cost mobile applications; new company's proprietary TMT technology offers alternative to conventional disk drive and FLASH memory architectures.

SUNNYVALE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 3, 1997--Cartesian Data Inc., a new company founded by former semiconductor and data storage executives, today announced that it has successfully demonstrated an advanced data storage architecture capable of delivering high capacity, low cost non-volatile data storage for mobile electronic applications.

The revolutionary, patented architecture, called Transverse Memory Technology(tm) (TMT)(tm) has been developed over the past two years, and is designed to meet the needs of Hand-Held PCs (HPCs), smart phones, digital cameras and other electronic products which are generally battery-powered, and require storage devices with a combination of non-volatility, low energy consumption, durability and moderate capacities at a low cost-per-megabyte.

Cartesian President James B. Downey, formerly president of Read-Rite Corp. and senior vice president of operations with Advanced Micro Devices, said the company will begin integrating the TMT technology into a commercially viable product. "We have successfully achieved all the engineering benchmarks needed to verify that TMT will perform effectively in mobile operations," Downey said.

"In addition to demonstrating the technology for key prospective OEM customers, we are adding technical refinements, commencing the initial product design for volume manufacturing, and raising additional funding to enable us to introduce a product to the market within the next nine to twelve months," he said.

Tom Griffin, Cartesian's vice president of marketing, said the products that will benefit most from TMT are those such as HPCs, which are storage intensive and participate in cost sensitive markets, but normally utilize costly embedded or PC card-based FLASH memory.

"For example," he said, "new software products for mobile computing, such as those based on Microsoft's Windows CE(r), typically will require at least 20MB of memory to provide the functionality customers demand," Griffin said.

"But it is a significant challenge to add functionality and maintain HPC pricing below the $1,000 level with FLASH technology; and hard disk drives lack the durability and low power performance that are essential in reliable mobile products. TMT integrates the most desirable features of traditional storage devices, without the economic and operational drawbacks associated with those platforms," he said.

According to Griffin, FLASH semiconductors provide non-volatility and reasonably low energy consumption, but read/write capabilities can be limited and the cost per megabyte is high. "Adding significant storage capacities with FLASH will be an expensive proposition for customers, even considering the most aggressive projected price declines for this technology over the next several years."

Griffin noted that hard disk drives, by contrast, offer very low cost-per-megabyte, but require significantly higher energy to operate and are inherently sensitive to shock or vibration.

"With TMT, we can achieve the best characteristics of both these technologies, but offer moderately high capacity storage at less than half the cost of FLASH devices," he added. Griffin said that an average of estimates from market researchers at Dataquest and InStat currently place FLASH memory at a price point of approximately $5 per megabyte by the year 2000.

"For customers looking to substantially improve the capabilities of mobile, handheld or portable products, this is an extremely attractive technology, in both performance and price."

Tim Bajarin, president of Creative Strategies Inc., San Jose, Calif., said, "Demand for a storage medium like this could be high. If Cartesian can deliver as promised, this new technology has a great chance to become a serious storage medium for many information and consumer products."

Although the proprietary Cartesian TMT architecture employs magnetic media and thin film heads, there is no rotating media as in hard disk drives. Instead a rectilinear, or X-Y ("Cartesian") coordinate motion of parallel read/write heads is used to read and record data to and from the storage media.

Using advanced mechanics and precision linear motors, TMT devices operate with extremely low energy consumption, undetectable head/media wear and fast access times. They offer excellent data integrity and high bandwidth. Designed with very low masses, TMT devices provide good tolerance for shock and vibration and small physical size, making them easy to integrate into a broad range of smaller-scale products.

Downey said that Cartesian expects to introduce a family of products to serve the mobile computing/communications and embedded systems marketplace. "Our early products will be add-on memory modules implemented in a standard PC card format, featuring an ATA bus interface for plug-and-play in DOS, Windows, Mac OS and other popular operating systems. Initial capacities will range between 20MB to 40MB, migrating to higher capacities over time.

"We expect pricing for these modules in volume to be less than 50 percent of projected FLASH memory prices," he said.

Downey said follow-on products will include embedded memory modules in small, but less constrained form factors, that offer the potential for capacities in the range of 200MB, resulting in even lower cost per megabyte of storage.

Cartesian Data Inc. is a privately held company headquartered in Sunnyvale. Founded in 1993, the firm employs 31 people, and is engaged in the design, development and marketing of advanced, moderate capacity storage devices for non-desktop PCs, mobile and telecommunications applications and embedded systems products. -0-

Note to Editors: Transverse Memory Technology(tm) and TMT(tm) are trademarks of Cartesian Data Inc. Windows CE(r) is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corp. DOS, Windows and Mac OS are trademarks of their respective owners.

CONTACT: Cartesian Data Inc.

Tom Griffin, 408/522-0808