SanDisk to Help Develop Memory Sticks

Posted By: Ed Thursday, September 6, 2001 7:28:01 AM

SanDisk has announced that within the next two quarters they will begin selling Memory Sticks. In the beginning, Sony will just supply SanDisk with Memory Sticks that it will resell under its own brand through its retail channel. However, the two companies also agreed to jointly develop the next generation of Memory Sticks that will incorporate advanced features such as significantly higher performance and storage capacities.

Suehiro Nakamura, executive deputy president of Sony Corporation said, "We are very pleased to announce the collaboration with SanDisk on Memory Stick. Our partnership with SanDisk, a world leader in memory cards, will allow us to increase Memory Stick market share and build a strong position to make Memory Stick as the standard of digital recording media in the world."

SanDisk is the world's largest supplier of flash data storage products. It designs, manufactures and markets solid-state data, digital imaging, and audio storage products and sells them from 29 thousand retail outlets.

In a related story, Hewlett-Packard recently announced a Memory Stick-compatible printer. The HP Photosmart P100 has a built-in Memory Stick slot letting users print digital photos directly from the Memory Stick and will be available in Europe in November.

Last month, Samsung announced it will begin adding Memory Stick slots to its future products, including handhelds.

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Down

Once Beta'd, twice shy.

slot_machine @ 9/6/2001 8:04:00 AM #
The Memory Stick is looking less and less like BetaMax.

They need SanDisk's help.

I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 8:32:18 AM #
They need SanDisk's engineers to beat Sony's people over the head. Sony's basically paying SanDisk to give thme some credibility in the market. Sony: "We need you to develop this whole new MemoryStick standard, because the current one is slow and crappy." SanDisk: "Well there this existing, fairly open, standard called Secure Digital that supports all of what you want." Sony: "No, we need to own it so we can license it out to everyone and fool consumers into thinking it's MemoryStick II even though it does nothing new for existing devices. Here's a lot of money to get the marketing BS rolling."

RE: They need SanDisk's help.
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 8:58:57 AM #
somehow I dobut you are on the inside track and were privy to the negotiations...

A more plausible scenario
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 9:14:22 AM #
Sony: Would you like to make a ton of money from our huge install base?

SanDisk: You betcha!

2c


RE: They need SanDisk's help.
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 9:19:13 AM #
Don't mind the original poster, he just needs attention.

RE: A more plausible scenario
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 10:25:25 AM #
The MemoryStick installed base is minimal in comparison to other flash media formats. Probably the most common device with a MemoryStick slot is a Sony laptop (at least in the US), and I'd bet 80% of the people with one don't even know what that slot is for.

This is obviously a Sony media ploy. That's why they're essentially giving SanDisk current MemorySticks to sell under the SanDisk brand. In the US anyhow, SanDisk is seen as "the" flash memory producer, which will add false credibility to MemoryStick as being a common format.

RE: They need SanDisk's help.
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 4:25:05 PM #
Wrong. Memory stick is now #2 behind compact flash.

RE: They need SanDisk's help.
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 4:40:26 PM #
And now #1 in Japan.

Companies Supporting the Memory Stick

rsuplido @ 9/6/2001 9:34:01 AM #
Memory Stick Supporting Companies' List (174Companies)
(as of August 24, 2001)

Acer Incorporated
Acer Laboratories Inc.
Adobe Systems Inc.
A. I. Corporation
AISIN AW CO., LTD.
AIWA Co., Ltd
Alpine Electronics, Inc.
ALPS ELECTRIC CO., LTD.
Apacer Technology Inc.
Aplix Corporation
ARENA INC.
ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC.
Audi AG
audio-technica corporation
BEHAVIOR TECH COMPUTER CORP.
Brother Industries, Ltd.
Buick
CARRY COMPUTER ENG. CO., LTD.
Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
Chant Sincere Co., Ltd.
China Great Wall Computer Group
Circuit City Stores, Inc.
CIS TECHNOLOGY INC.
Clarion Co., Ltd.
CLEVO CO.
CODEC CO., LTD.
Compaq Computer Corporation
Cyber Solutions Corp.
DataFab Systems Inc.
DATASTOR TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD.
DataTec Co., Ltd.
DBTEL Incorporated
DDK Ltd.
Delphi Automotive Systems
DENSO CORPORATION
Digital Stream Corporation
DioGraphy Inc.
Dura Micro Inc.
EagleTec (Asia) Ltd.
ELITEGROUP COMPUTER SYSTEMS CO., LTD
ENE Technology Inc.
e-PROCONN CO., LTD
eSOL Co., Ltd.
FAITH, INC.
FamilyMart Co., Ltd.
famima.com Co., Ltd
FEIYA Technology Corporation
First International Computer, Inc.
FOXCONN JAPAN Co., Ltd.
France Telecom
FueTrek CO., LTD.
FUJIFILM MICRODEVICES Co., Ltd.
Fujitsu Ltd.
Fujitsu-Takamizawa Components Ltd.
Fujitsu Ten Ltd.
Funai Electric Co., Ltd.
General Motors Corporation
Genesys Logic Inc.
GVC CORPORATION
HAGIWARA SYS-COM CO., LTD.
Hewlett Packard Company
HIROSE ELECTRIC CO., LTD.
Hitachi, Ltd.Semiconductor Group
Holden
Honda Motor Co., Ltd.
Hosiden Corporation
Hsing Tech Enterprise Co., Ltd.
IBM Corporation
InnoGear Inc.
Integrated Technology Express, Inc
I-O DATA DEVICE, INC.
I/O Interconnect,Inc.
Iomega Corporation
Iriso Electronics Co., Ltd.
ITT Cannon, Ltd
JALCO CO., LTD.
Japan Aviation Electronics Industry Ltd.
Johnson Controls, Inc.
KATO SPRING WORKS CO., LTD.
KDDI CORPORATION
KEL CORPORATION
Kenwood Corporation
Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V.
Kouwell Electronics Corp.
Kyocera Corporation
Kyocera Elco Corporation
Lexar Media
LG Electronics Inc.
LinkUp Systems Corporation
Liquid Audio, Inc.
LOGITEC CORPORATION
Marantz Japan, Inc.
MARUNIX CO., LTD.
Matsushita Automation Controls Ltd.
Matsushita Electric Works?CLtd.
Mazda Motor Corporation
Media Tek Inc.
MegaChips Corporation
MELCO INC.
MICRO-STAR INT'L CO., LTD.
Minolta Co., Ltd.
Mitsubishi Electric Corporation Inc.
MITSUI & CO., LTD.
MITSUMI ELECTRIC CO., LTD.
Mobile Computing Technologies Corp
MobileTech Inc.
Molex Japan CO., LTD.
Motorola, Inc
music.co.jp.,inc
NAVITIME JAPAN CO., LTD.
NEC Corporation (NEC Electron Devices)
NTRU Cryptosystems, Inc.
NTT DoCoMo, Inc.
O2Micro International LTD.
Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd.
Olympus Optical Co., Ltd.
OMRON Corporation
Onkyo Corporation
OnSpec Electronic, Inc.
Opel
PACIFIC TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD.
Palm, Inc.
Parthus Technologies plc
PictureIQ Corporation
Pioneer Corporation
PortalPlayer, Inc.c
Pretec Electronic Corporation
Preview Systems Inc.
PRIMAX ELECTRONICS LTD.
Quanta Computer Inc.
RealNetworks, Inc.
REXON TECHNOLOGY CORP., LTD.
Ricoh Co., Ltd.
Run Wave Co., Ltd.
Saab
Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.
Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd.
SCM Microsystems, Inc.
Seiko Epson Corporation
Sharp Corporation
Shanghai General Electronics(Group)Co., Ltd.
Shinko Shoji Co.,Ltd
Silicon Integrated Systems Corp.
SILITEK CORPORATION
SmartDisk Corporation
SMK Corporation
Sony Corporation
STANDARD MICROSYSTEMS CORPORATION
STMicroelectronics S.r.l.
TAIKO DENKI Co., Ltd.
Taiwan Zetatronic Industrial Co., Ltd.
Tanita Corporation
TDK Corporation
Teac Co., Ltd.
Texas Instruments Incorporated
TOHO BUSINESS MANAGEMENT CENTER
TOKYO ELECTRON DEVICE LTD.
Total Technology Company Ltd.
TOYOTA MOTOR CORPORATION
Tyco Electronics AMP K.K.
UNION MACHINERY Co., Ltd.
Vauxhall
VIA TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
Viking Components, Inc.
VITEC CO., LTD.
Volkswagen AG
Waka Manufacturing Co., Ltd.
Western Digital Corp.
Winbond Electronics Corp.
Xanavi Informatics Corporation
Yamaha Corporation
YAMAICHI ELECTRONICS CO., LTD.
YAXAKI SYSCOMPLUS CO., LTD
YE Data Inc.

plus: SanDisk

Taken from:
http://www.memorystick.org/msinfo/eng/memberlist/index.html

RE: Companies Supporting the Memory Stick
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 9:39:19 AM #
Wow. It's surprising that there are a lot of car companies in the list.

RE: Companies Supporting the Memory Stick
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 9:41:43 AM #
WOW! That was incredibly useful!

Next time, just post the URL, eh? Save those maaad copy & paste skillz for MS Word. ;)

RE: Companies Supporting the Memory Stick
rsuplido @ 9/6/2001 9:44:26 AM #
It has more impact. ;) Yeah, I was surprised with the list too.

RE: Companies Supporting the Memory Stick
Moosecat @ 9/6/2001 9:57:17 AM #
What a useless list. I have no idea what "supporting" the Memory Stick means. It might mean Sony called these companies and said "We'll pay you $50,000 if you will sign on to our 'Memory Stick Support Club.' You'll receive free stickers and an excellent decoder ring."

I doubt that the car companies on that list are going to be doing much marketing/development/sales of Memory Stick devices.

RE: Companies Supporting the Memory Stick
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 10:02:10 AM #
Then the list would be longer ;)

RE: Companies Supporting the Memory Stick
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 10:05:53 AM #
>>What a useless list. I have no idea what "supporting" the Memory Stick means.

It might be as easy as a ("Memory Stick" and "") search at Google.

RE: Companies Supporting the Memory Stick
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 10:11:33 AM #
That's ("Memory Stick" and "Company Name").

RE: Companies Supporting the Memory Stick
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 10:23:06 AM #
Regarding car companies, I found an aritcle from PCWorld dated 02/24/2000:

Here's part of it:
"The chances of Memory Stick becoming a cross-platform format between portable electronics devices and automobiles was further increased with the naming of a host of auto industry backers. General Motors, Holden, Opel, Saab, and Vauxhall joined Audi AG and Volkswagen AG as licensees, and auto electronics makers Fujitsu and Xanavi Informatics also announced support for the format, Sony says."

http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,15450,00.asp


RE: Companies Supporting the Memory Stick
mikecane @ 9/6/2001 10:36:36 AM #
Moosecat is right. Such a list does nothing unless you can point to *every* company on that list having released a product that uses MS/MG. It is hype.

But I'm still glad to see being aggressive with MS. Now if only they could get the prices down even more!

RE: Companies Supporting the Memory Stick
Snubolis @ 9/6/2001 12:20:00 PM #
You forgot to add Epson to that list... they are currently the only manufacturer on the market that supports the memory stick in their photo printers (stylus photo 785ex).



Snubolis
Vancouver, Canada

I/O Standard for Memory Stick

I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 9:43:25 AM #
I'm sure this is a stupid question, but does Memory Stick already have an I/O standard for other peripherals (ie, not just memory)?

If so, this may not bode well for all of the m505 users.

RE: I/O Standard for Memory Stick
rsuplido @ 9/6/2001 9:46:58 AM #
It seems like Sony has outlined the Memory Stick standard well.

See:
http://www.memorystick.org/e-index.html

RE: I/O Standard for Memory Stick
Ed @ 9/6/2001 9:50:17 AM #
You might be interested to see the I/O peripherals that Sony has in development, including one for Bluetooth:
www.palminfocenter.com/view_Story.asp?ID=1781
And also a digital camera, GPS, and fingerprint recognition ones:
www.palminfocenter.com/view_Story.asp?ID=1778

In the second story, it looks like development is taking longer than expected and these probably won't be out until next year. However, Sony is expected to release the Bluetooth MemStick at about the same time Palm releases its Bluetooth SD one.

---
News Editor

RE: I/O Standard for Memory Stick
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 10:43:03 AM #
" It seems like Sony has outlined the Memory Stick standard well."

Care to point out which document at the site you gave specifies an I/O standard? There is not one there from what I can see.


RE: I/O Standard for Memory Stick
rsuplido @ 9/6/2001 12:21:42 PM #
They have detailed the MS format specifications on PDF files. Some requires though that you are a registered developer to view them. There are exerpts though (see Format Specifications (excerpt) area).

RE: I/O Standard for Memory Stick
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 2:54:46 PM #
I looked at the one format specifications document that I saw and all that it shows are file formats for the memory cards. Dumb things like how you lay out your MP3 files in the filesystem so they play in a particular order. If there was an I/O spec, I'd expect some third party would have developed (or at least announced) something supporting it by now.

Killer Moves

I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 11:08:53 AM #
Sony is making all the right moves to establish the memory stick as the standard memory storage. Man Sony is just making Palm look silly with all these "logical" moves to establish itself as the premier PDA maker.

RE: Killer Moves
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 11:58:56 AM #
Unfortunately, they're all the wrong moves for consumer's long term interests, and only geared at increasing Sony's licensing power and making Sony more money.

RE: Killer Moves
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 2:19:26 PM #
not necessarily wrong for consumers - for example, sandisk has the right distribution capabilities to get the memory sticks in the right brick and click outlets so people can buy them - may be different that where sony distributes today (e.g. computer stores, etc.) - this is part of what sony is paying for

RE: Killer Moves
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 11:30:29 PM #
Allowing companies to get monopolistic positions is always bad for consumers. You're probably glad that Microsoft got their slap on the wrist today too huh? Getting MemoryStick to more consumer outlets only serves Sony.

Palm vs Sony users

I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 12:09:43 PM #
I can sense that people posting here is either die hard SD/MMC users or die hard MS/MG users.

It's hard to have an open mind if you side with something.

RE: Palm vs Sony users
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 2:48:36 PM #
Unfortunately, there aren't nearly enough "users" of either technology yet, at least when it comes to peripherals.

Really more of a standards thing.
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/6/2001 11:35:02 PM #
SD is more of an open standard, MemoryStick belongs to Sony. In the long run, other businesses, manufacturers and consumers win out with a more open standard. SD is already designed to do most, if not all, of what Sony wants the next generation of MemoryStick to do. The current MemoryStick design and protocols are not even close in capability to what SD is designed to do.

RE: Die Hard SD/MS users.
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/7/2001 2:10:01 AM #
Actually, I'm a die-hard CF user. I've got a 56k CF Modem and a 32mb card for my TRG, complete with VFS support - I've had it for a while now.

If I /wanted/ a Ethernet card, they're available, and the drivers for several diffrent models are out of beta.
Or the Pocket Spider. Or an extra serial port. I could go on, but why taunt? It's more than is available for SD /or/ MS, and faster than either, at any rate.

Bluetooth CF cards are alledgedly 'In the works', but I've been around the computer industry long enough to not put too heavy a trust in what people /say/ they'll develop /someday/. That's why I bought a PDA that supports actual, exsisting standards with actual hardware already in production for them.

Oh, and I heard that Handspring's new PDAs aren't going to have springboard slots on them. I'm sure that will do LOTS to encourage people to further develop for the interface. Good luck, guys.


Actual Size

kaosfury @ 9/6/2001 3:07:15 PM #
The real question is are they going to use industry standard, or their standard when labeling the size? Currently they use 1,000,000 bytes as 1Mb. Binary though would say that 1MB = 1,048,576 bytes. On a 256MB card that would be 268,435,456 bytes, a 12,435,456 byte difference. So a 256Mb card is actually 244Mb.

Why they change the standard to suit their purposes I don't know.

http://www.sandisk.com/tech/faq_search.asp


--
Karl Browning
kaosfury@yahoo.com

RE: Actual Size
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/8/2001 12:42:32 PM #
My 128 Mb says it has 49152 bytes used and 129646592 bytes free, for a grand total of 129695744 bytes, not 128000000.

I don't know what the standard says, but I think it can't be 1000000 bytes/MB...

there's room for both but look what could've happened...

AriB @ 9/7/2001 6:26:05 AM #
SD may be an open standard but Memory Stick looks like it will be a de facto standard. I really don't care if my memory has an SD or MS on it as long as I get enough of it and at a good price. On the other hand we will never see the equivalent of a CD for handheld devices because the 'damage' has been done. Sony isn't going to give up MS (remember they have an entire line of products that use it), Palm and Panasonic won't give up SD and there are many other devices out there that use CF. In the future I don't think I/O will be such a big deal because pda's will have bluetooth, wireless modem and all sorts of stuff already built in but it would've been nice if you could buy a card filled with games, etc and just plug it into any Palm device

RE: there's room for both but look what could've happened...
I.M. Anonymous @ 9/7/2001 10:01:44 AM #
For years, we've had ISA, PCI, PCMCIA and lately CF. This resulted in good competition in the computer industry resulting in better products and prices for all. I feel like we're on the virge of stepping back into the dark ages.

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